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Chapter LXV: Elevation Of Timour Or Tamerlane, And His Death. -- Part
II.

The military republic of the Mamalukes still reigned in Egypt and Syria:
but the dynasty of the Turks was overthrown by that of the Circassians;
^33 and their favorite Barkok, from a slave and a prisoner, was raised
and restored to the throne. In the midst of rebellion and discord, he
braved the menaces, corresponded with the enemies, and detained the
ambassadors, of the Mogul, who patiently expected his decease, to
revenge the crimes of the father on the feeble reign of his son Farage.
The Syrian emirs ^34 were assembled at Aleppo to repel the invasion:
they confided in the fame and discipline of the Mamalukes, in the temper
of their swords and lances of the purest steel of Damascus, in the
strength of their walled cities, and in the populousness of sixty
thousand villages; and instead of sustaining a siege, they threw open
their gates, and arrayed their forces in the plain. But these forces
were not cemented by virtue and union; and some powerful emirs had been
seduced to desert or betray their more loyal companions. Timour's front
was covered with a line of Indian elephants, whose turrets were filled
with archers and Greek fire: the rapid evolutions of his cavalry
completed the dismay and disorder; the Syrian crowds fell back on each
other: many thousands were stifled or slaughtered in the entrance of the
great street; the Moguls entered with the fugitives; and after a short
defence, the citadel, the impregnable citadel of Aleppo, was surrendered
by cowardice or treachery. Among the suppliants and captives, Timour
distinguished the doctors of the law, whom he invited to the dangerous
honor of a personal conference. ^35 The Mogul prince was a zealous
Mussulman; but his Persian schools had taught him to revere the memory
of Ali and Hosein; and he had imbibed a deep prejudice against the
Syrians, as the enemies of the son of the daughter of the apostle of
God. To these doctors he proposed a captious question, which the
casuists of Bochara, Samarcand, and Herat, were incapable of resolving.
"Who are the true martyrs, of those who are slain on my side, or on that
of my enemies?" But he was silenced, or satisfied, by the dexterity of
one of the cadhis of Aleppo, who replied in the words of Mahomet
himself, that the motive, not the ensign, constitutes the martyr; and
that the Moslems of either party, who fight only for the glory of God,
may deserve that sacred appellation. The true succession of the caliphs
was a controversy of a still more delicate nature; and the frankness of
a doctor, too honest for his situation, provoked the emperor to exclaim,
"Ye are as false as those of Damascus: Moawiyah was a usurper, Yezid a
tyrant, and Ali alone is the lawful successor of the prophet." A prudent
explanation restored his tranquillity; and he passed to a more familiar
topic of conversation. "What is your age?" said he to the cadhi. "Fifty
years." -- "It would be the age of my eldest son: you see me here
(continued Timour) a poor lame, decrepit mortal. Yet by my arm has the
Almighty been pleased to subdue the kingdoms of Iran, Touran, and the
Indies. I am not a man of blood; and God is my witness, that in all my
wars I have never been the aggressor, and that my enemies have always
been the authors of their own calamity." During this peaceful
conversation the streets of Aleppo streamed with blood, and reechoed
with the cries of mothers and children, with the shrieks of violated
virgins. The rich plunder that was abandoned to his soldiers might
stimulate their avarice; but their cruelty was enforced by the
peremptory command of producing an adequate number of heads, which,
according to his custom, were curiously piled in columns and pyramids:
the Moguls celebrated the feast of victory, while the surviving Moslems
passed the night in tears and in chains. I shall not dwell on the march
of the destroyer from Aleppo to Damascus, where he was rudely
encountered, and almost overthrown, by the armies of Egypt. A retrograde
motion was imputed to his distress and despair: one of his nephews
deserted to the enemy; and Syria rejoiced in the tale of his defeat,
when the sultan was driven by the revolt of the Mamalukes to escape with
precipitation and shame to his palace of Cairo. Abandoned by their
prince, the inhabitants of Damascus still defended their walls; and
Timour consented to raise the siege, if they would adorn his retreat
with a gift or ransom; each article of nine pieces. But no sooner had he
introduced himself into the city, under color of a truce, than he
perfidiously violated the treaty; imposed a contribution of ten millions
of gold; and animated his troops to chastise the posterity of those
Syrians who had executed, or approved, the murder of the grandson of
Mahomet. A family which had given honorable burial to the head of
Hosein, and a colony of artificers, whom he sent to labor at Samarcand,
were alone reserved in the general massacre, and after a period of seven
centuries, Damascus was reduced to ashes, because a Tartar was moved by
religious zeal to avenge the blood of an Arab. The losses and fatigues
of the campaign obliged Timour to renounce the conquest of Palestine and
Egypt; but in his return to the Euphrates he delivered Aleppo to the
flames; and justified his pious motive by the pardon and reward of two
thousand sectaries of Ali, who were desirous to visit the tomb of his
son. I have expatiated on the personal anecdotes which mark the
character of the Mogul hero; but I shall briefly mention, ^36 that he
erected on the ruins of Bagdad a pyramid of ninety thousand heads; again
visited Georgia; encamped on the banks of Araxes; and proclaimed his
resolution of marching against the Ottoman emperor. Conscious of the
importance of the war, he collected his forces from every province:
eight hundred thousand men were enrolled on his military list; ^37 but
the splendid commands of five, and ten, thousand horse, may be rather
expressive of the rank and pension of the chiefs, than of the genuine
number of effective soldiers. ^38 In the pillage of Syria, the Moguls
had acquired immense riches: but the delivery of their pay and arrears
for seven years more firmly attached them to the Imperial standard.

[Footnote 33: See the reigns of Barkok and Pharadge, in M. De Guignes,
(tom. iv. l. xxii.,) who, from the Arabic texts of Aboulmahasen, Ebn
(Schounah, and Aintabi, has added some facts to our common stock of
materials.]

[Footnote 34: For these recent and domestic transactions, Arabshah,
though a partial, is a credible, witness, (tom. i. c. 64--68, tom. ii.
c. 1--14.) Timour must have been odious to a Syrian; but the notoriety
of facts would have obliged him, in some measure, to respect his enemy
and himself. His bitters may correct the luscious sweets of Sherefeddin,
(l. v. c. 17--29.)]

[Footnote 35: These interesting conversations appear to have been copied
by Arabshah (tom. i. c. 68, p. 625--645) from the cadhi and historian
Ebn Schounah, a principal actor. Yet how could he be alive seventy-five
years afterwards? (D'Herbelot, p. 792.)]

[Footnote 36: The marches and occupations of Timour between the Syrian
and Ottoman wars are represented by Sherefeddin (l. v. c. 29--43) and
Arabshah, (tom. ii. c. 15--18.)]

[Footnote 37: This number of 800,000 was extracted by Arabshah, or
rather by Ebn Schounah, ex rationario Timuri, on the faith of a
Carizmian officer, (tom. i. c. 68, p. 617;) and it is remarkable enough,
that a Greek historian (Phranza, l. i. c. 29) adds no more than 20,000
men. Poggius reckons 1,000,000; another Latin contemporary (Chron.
Tarvisianum, apud Muratori, tom. xix. p. 800) 1,100,000; and the
enormous sum of 1,600,000 is attested by a German soldier, who was
present at the battle of Angora, (Leunclav. ad Chalcondyl. l. iii. p.
82.) Timour, in his Institutions, has not deigned to calculate his
troops, his subjects, or his revenues.]

[Footnote 38: A wide latitude of non-effectives was allowed by the Great
Mogul for his own pride and the benefit of his officers. Bernier's
patron was Penge-Hazari, commander of 5000 horse; of which he maintained
no more than 500, (Voyages, tom. i. p. 288, 289.)]

During this diversion of the Mogul arms, Bajazet had two years to
collect his forces for a more serious encounter. They consisted of four
hundred thousand horse and foot, ^39 whose merit and fidelity were of an
unequal complexion. We may discriminate the Janizaries, who have been
gradually raised to an establishment of forty thousand men; a national
cavalry, the Spahis of modern times; twenty thousand cuirassiers of
Europe, clad in black and impenetrable armor; the troops of Anatolia,
whose princes had taken refuge in the camp of Timour, and a colony of
Tartars, whom he had driven from Kipzak, and to whom Bajazet had
assigned a settlement in the plains of Adrianople. The fearless
confidence of the sultan urged him to meet his antagonist; and, as if he
had chosen that spot for revenge, he displayed his banner near the ruins
of the unfortunate Suvas. In the mean while, Timour moved from the
Araxes through the countries of Armenia and Anatolia: his boldness was
secured by the wisest precautions; his speed was guided by order and
discipline; and the woods, the mountains, and the rivers, were
diligently explored by the flying squadrons, who marked his road and
preceded his standard. Firm in his plan of fighting in the heart of the
Ottoman kingdom, he avoided their camp; dexterously inclined to the
left; occupied Cæsarea; traversed the salt desert and the River Halys;
and invested Angora: while the sultan, immovable and ignorant in his
post, compared the Tartar swiftness to the crawling of a snail; ^40 he
returned on the wings of indignation to the relief of Angora: and as
both generals were alike impatient for action, the plains round that
city were the scene of a memorable battle, which has immortalized the
glory of Timour and the shame of Bajazet. For this signal victory the
Mogul emperor was indebted to himself, to the genius of the moment, and
the discipline of thirty years. He had improved the tactics, without
violating the manners, of his nation, ^41 whose force still consisted in
the missile weapons, and rapid evolutions, of a numerous cavalry. From a
single troop to a great army, the mode of attack was the same: a
foremost line first advanced to the charge, and was supported in a just
order by the squadrons of the great vanguard. The general's eye watched
over the field, and at his command the front and rear of the right and
left wings successively moved forwards in their several divisions, and
in a direct or oblique line: the enemy was pressed by eighteen or twenty
attacks; and each attack afforded a chance of victory. If they all
proved fruitless or unsuccessful, the occasion was worthy of the emperor
himself, who gave the signal of advancing to the standard and main body,
which he led in person. ^42 But in the battle of Angora, the main body
itself was supported, on the flanks and in the rear, by the bravest
squadrons of the reserve, commanded by the sons and grandsons of Timour.
The conqueror of Hindostan ostentatiously showed a line of elephants,
the trophies, rather than the instruments, of victory; the use of the
Greek fire was familiar to the Moguls and Ottomans; but had they
borrowed from Europe the recent invention of gunpowder and cannon, the
artificial thunder, in the hands of either nation, must have turned the
fortune of the day. ^43 In that day Bajazet displayed the qualities of a
soldier and a chief: but his genius sunk under a stronger ascendant;
and, from various motives, the greatest part of his troops failed him in
the decisive moment. His rigor and avarice ^* had provoked a mutiny
among the Turks; and even his son Soliman too hastily withdrew from the
field. The forces of Anatolia, loyal in their revolt, were drawn away to
the banners of their lawful princes. His Tartar allies had been tempted
by the letters and emissaries of Timour; ^44 who reproached their
ignoble servitude under the slaves of their fathers; and offered to
their hopes the dominion of their new, or the liberty of their ancient,
country. In the right wing of Bajazet the cuirassiers of Europe charged,
with faithful hearts and irresistible arms: but these men of iron were
soon broken by an artful flight and headlong pursuit; and the
Janizaries, alone, without cavalry or missile weapons, were encompassed
by the circle of the Mogul hunters. Their valor was at length oppressed
by heat, thirst, and the weight of numbers; and the unfortunate sultan,
afflicted with the gout in his hands and feet, was transported from the
field on the fleetest of his horses. He was pursued and taken by the
titular khan of Zagatai; and, after his capture, and the defeat of the
Ottoman powers, the kingdom of Anatolia submitted to the conqueror, who
planted his standard at Kiotahia, and dispersed on all sides the
ministers of rapine and destruction. Mirza Mehemmed Sultan, the eldest
and best beloved of his grandsons, was despatched to Boursa, with thirty
thousand horse; and such was his youthful ardor, that he arrived with
only four thousand at the gates of the capital, after performing in five
days a march of two hundred and thirty miles. Yet fear is still more
rapid in its course; and Soliman, the son of Bajazet, had already passed
over to Europe with the royal treasure. The spoil, however, of the
palace and city was immense: the inhabitants had escaped; but the
buildings, for the most part of wood, were reduced to ashes From Boursa,
the grandson of Timour advanced to Nice, ever yet a fair and flourishing
city; and the Mogul squadrons were only stopped by the waves of the
Propontis. The same success attended the other mirzas and emirs in their
excursions; and Smyrna, defended by the zeal and courage of the Rhodian
knights, alone deserved the presence of the emperor himself. After an
obstinate defence, the place was taken by storm: all that breathed was
put to the sword; and the heads of the Christian heroes were launched
from the engines, on board of two carracks, or great ships of Europe,
that rode at anchor in the harbor. The Moslems of Asia rejoiced in their
deliverance from a dangerous and domestic foe; and a parallel was drawn
between the two rivals, by observing that Timour, in fourteen days, had
reduced a fortress which had sustained seven years the siege, or at
least the blockade, of Bajazet. ^45

[Footnote 39: Timour himself fixes at 400,000 men the Ottoman army,
(Institutions, p. 153,) which is reduced to 150,000 by Phranza, (l. i.
c. 29,) and swelled by the German soldier to 1,400,000. It is evident
that the Moguls were the more numerous.]

[Footnote 40: It may not be useless to mark the distances between Angora
and the neighboring cities, by the journeys of the caravans, each of
twenty or twenty-five miles; to Smyrna xx., to Kiotahia x., to Boursa
x., to Cæsarea, viii., to Sinope x., to Nicomedia ix., to Constantinople
xii. or xiii., (see Tournefort, Voyage au Levant, tom. ii. lettre xxi.)]

[Footnote 41: See the Systems of Tactics in the Institutions, which the
English editors have illustrated with elaborate plans, (p. 373--407.)]

[Footnote 42: The sultan himself (says Timour) must then put the foot of
courage into the stirrup of patience. A Tartar metaphor, which is lost
in the English, but preserved in the French, version of the Institutes,
(p. 156, 157.)]

[Footnote 43: The Greek fire, on Timour's side, is attested by
Sherefeddin, (l. v. c. 47;) but Voltaire's strange suspicion, that some
cannon, inscribed with strange characters, must have been sent by that
monarch to Delhi, is refuted by the universal silence of
contemporaries.]

[Footnote *: See V. Hammer, vol. i. p. 310, for the singular hints which
were conveyed to him of the wisdom of unlocking his hoarded treasures.
-- M.]

[Footnote 44: Timour has dissembled this secret and important
negotiation with the Tartars, which is indisputably proved by the joint
evidence of the Arabian, (tom. i. c. 47, p. 391,) Turkish, (Annal.
Leunclav. p. 321,) and Persian historians, (Khondemir, apud d'Herbelot,
p. 882.)]

[Footnote 45: For the war of Anatolia or Roum, I add some hints in the
Institutions, to the copious narratives of Sherefeddin (l. v. c. 44--65)
and Arabshah, (tom. ii. c. 20--35.) On this part only of Timour's
history it is lawful to quote the Turks, (Cantemir, p. 53--55, Annal.
Leunclav. p. 320--322,) and the Greeks, (Phranza, l. i. c. 59, Ducas, c.
15--17, Chalcondyles, l. iii.)]

The iron cagein which Bajazet was imprisoned by Tamerlane, so long and
so often repeated as a moral lesson, is now rejected as a fable by the
modern writers, who smile at the vulgar credulity. ^46 They appeal with
confidence to the Persian history of Sherefeddin Ali, which has been
given to our curiosity in a French version, and from which I shall
collect and abridge a more specious narrative of this memorable
transaction. No sooner was Timour informed that the captive Ottoman was
at the door of his tent, than he graciously stepped forwards to receive
him, seated him by his side, and mingled with just reproaches a soothing
pity for his rank and misfortune. "Alas!" said the emperor, "the decree
of fate is now accomplished by your own fault; it is the web which you
have woven, the thorns of the tree which yourself have planted. I wished
to spare, and even to assist, the champion of the Moslems; you braved
our threats; you despised our friendship; you forced us to enter your
kingdom with our invincible armies. Behold the event. Had you
vanquished, I am not ignorant of the fate which you reserved for myself
and my troops. But I disdain to retaliate: your life and honor are
secure; and I shall express my gratitude to God by my clemency to man."
The royal captive showed some signs of repentance, accepted the
humiliation of a robe of honor, and embraced with tears his son Mousa,
who, at his request, was sought and found among the captives of the
field. The Ottoman princes were lodged in a splendid pavilion; and the
respect of the guards could be surpassed only by their vigilance. On the
arrival of the harem from Boursa, Timour restored the queen Despina and
her daughter to their father and husband; but he piously required, that
the Servian princess, who had hitherto been indulged in the profession
of Christianity, should embrace without delay the religion of the
prophet. In the feast of victory, to which Bajazet was invited, the
Mogul emperor placed a crown on his head and a sceptre in his hand, with
a solemn assurance of restoring him with an increase of glory to the
throne of his ancestors. But the effect of his promise was disappointed
by the sultan's untimely death: amidst the care of the most skilful
physicians, he expired of an apoplexy at Akshehr, the Antioch of
Pisidia, about nine months after his defeat. The victor dropped a tear
over his grave: his body, with royal pomp, was conveyed to the mausoleum
which he had erected at Boursa; and his son Mousa, after receiving a
rich present of gold and jewels, of horses and arms, was invested by a
patent in red ink with the kingdom of Anatolia.

[Footnote 46: The scepticism of Voltaire (Essai sur l'Histoire Générale,
c. 88) is ready on this, as on every occasion, to reject a popular tale,
and to diminish the magnitude of vice and virtue; and on most occasions
his incredulity is reasonable.]

Such is the portrait of a generous conqueror, which has been extracted
from his own memorials, and dedicated to his son and grandson, nineteen
years after his decease; ^47 and, at a time when the truth was
remembered by thousands, a manifest falsehood would have implied a
satire on his real conduct. Weighty indeed is this evidence, adopted by
all the Persian histories; ^48 yet flattery, more especially in the
East, is base and audacious; and the harsh and ignominious treatment of
Bajazet is attested by a chain of witnesses, some of whom shall be
produced in the order of their time and country. 1.The reader has not
forgot the garrison of French, whom the marshal Boucicault left behind
him for the defence of Constantinople. They were on the spot to receive
the earliest and most faithful intelligence of the overthrow of their
great adversary; and it is more than probable, that some of them
accompanied the Greek embassy to the camp of Tamerlane. From their
account, the hardshipsof the prison and death of Bajazet are affirmed by
the marshal's servant and historian, within the distance of seven years.
^49 2.The name of Poggius the Italian ^50 is deservedly famous among the
revivers of learning in the fifteenth century. His elegant dialogue on
the vicissitudes of fortune ^51 was composed in his fiftieth year,
twenty-eight years after the Turkish victory of Tamerlane; ^52 whom he
celebrates as not inferior to the illustrious Barbarians of antiquity.
Of his exploits and discipline Poggius was informed by several ocular
witnesses; nor does he forget an example so apposite to his theme as the
Ottoman monarch, whom the Scythian confined like a wild beast in an iron
cage, and exhibited a spectacle to Asia. I might add the authority of
two Italian chronicles, perhaps of an earlier date, which would prove at
least that the same story, whether false or true, was imported into
Europe with the first tidings of the revolution. ^53 3.At the time when
Poggius flourished at Rome, Ahmed Ebn Arabshah composed at Damascus the
florid and malevolent history of Timour, for which he had collected
materials in his journeys over Turkey and Tartary. ^54 Without any
possible correspondence between the Latin and the Arabian writer, they
agree in the fact of the iron cage; and their agreement is a striking
proof of their common veracity. Ahmed Arabshah likewise relates another
outrage, which Bajazet endured, of a more domestic and tender nature.
His indiscreet mention of women and divorces was deeply resented by the
jealous Tartar: in the feast of victory the wine was served by female
cupbearers, and the sultan beheld his own concubines and wives
confounded among the slaves, and exposed without a veil to the eyes of
intemperance. To escape a similar indignity, it is said that his
successors, except in a single instance, have abstained from legitimate
nuptials; and the Ottoman practice and belief, at least in the sixteenth
century, is asserted by the observing Busbequius, ^55 ambassador from
the court of Vienna to the great Soliman. 4.Such is the separation of
language, that the testimony of a Greek is not less independent than
that of a Latin or an Arab. I suppress the names of Chalcondyles and
Ducas, who flourished in the latter period, and who speak in a less
positive tone; but more attention is due to George Phranza, ^56
protovestiare of the last emperors, and who was born a year before the
battle of Angora. Twenty-two years after that event, he was sent
ambassador to Amurath the Second; and the historian might converse with
some veteran Janizaries, who had been made prisoners with the sultan,
and had themselves seen him in his iron cage. 5. The last evidence, in
every sense, is that of the Turkish annals, which have been consulted or
transcribed by Leunclavius, Pocock, and Cantemir. ^57 They unanimously
deplore the captivity of the iron cage; and some credit may be allowed
to national historians, who cannot stigmatize the Tartar without
uncovering the shame of their king and country.

[Footnote 47: See the History of Sherefeddin, (l. v. c. 49, 52, 53, 59,
60.) This work was finished at Shiraz, in the year 1424, and dedicated
to Sultan Ibrahim, the son of Sharokh, the son of Timour, who reigned in
Farsistan in his father's lifetime.]

[Footnote 48: After the perusal of Khondemir, Ebn Schounah, &c., the
learned D'Herbelot (Bibliot. Orientale, p. 882) may affirm, that this
fable is not mentioned in the most authentic histories; but his denial
of the visible testimony of Arabshah leaves some room to suspect his
accuracy.]

[Footnote 49: Et fut lui-même (Bajazet) pris, et menéen prison, en
laquelle mourut de dure mort!Mémoires de Boucicault, P. i. c. 37. These
Memoirs were composed while the marshal was still governor of Genoa,
from whence he was expelled in the year 1409, by a popular insurrection,
(Muratori, Annali d'Italia, tom. xii. p. 473, 474.)]

[Footnote 50: The reader will find a satisfactory account of the life
and writings of Poggius in the Poggiana, an entertaining work of M.
Lenfant, and in the Bibliotheca Latina Mediæet InfimæÆtatis of
Fabricius, (tom. v. p. 305--308.) Poggius was born in the year 1380, and
died in 1459.]

[Footnote 51: The dialogue de Varietate Fortunæ, (of which a complete
and elegant edition has been published at Paris in 1723, in 4to.,) was
composed a short time before the death of Pope Martin V., (p. 5,) and
consequently about the end of the year 1430.]

[Footnote 52: See a splendid and eloquent encomium of Tamerlane, p.
36--39 ipse enim novi (says Poggius) qui fuere in ejus castris . . . .
Regem vivum cepit, caveâque in modum feræinclusum per omnem Asian
circumtulit egregium admirandumque spectaculum fortunæ.]

[Footnote 53: The Chronicon Tarvisianum, (in Muratori, Script. Rerum
Italicarum tom. xix. p. 800,) and the Annales Estenses, (tom. xviii. p.
974.) The two authors, Andrea de Redusiis de Quero, and James de
Delayto, were both contemporaries, and both chancellors, the one of
Trevigi, the other of Ferrara. The evidence of the former is the most
positive.]

[Footnote 54: See Arabshah, tom. ii. c. 28, 34. He travelled in regiones
Rumæas, A. H. 839, (A.D. 1435, July 27,) tom. i. c. 2, p. 13.]

[Footnote 55: Busbequius in Legatione Turcicâ, epist. i. p. 52. Yet his
respectable authority is somewhat shaken by the subsequent marriages of
Amurath II. with a Servian, and of Mahomet II. with an Asiatic,
princess, (Cantemir, p. 83, 93.)]

[Footnote 56: See the testimony of George Phranza, (l. i. c. 29,) and
his life in Hanckius (de Script. Byzant. P. i. c. 40.) Chalcondyles and
Ducas speak in general terms of Bajazet's chains.]

[Footnote 57: Annales Leunclav. p. 321. Pocock, Prolegomen. ad
Abulpharag Dynast. Cantemir, p. 55. *

Note: * Von Hammer, p. 318, cites several authorities unknown to Gibbon.
-- M.]

From these opposite premises, a fair and moderate conclusion may be
deduced. I am satisfied that Sherefeddin Ali has faithfully described
the first ostentatious interview, in which the conqueror, whose spirits
were harmonized by success, affected the character of generosity. But
his mind was insensibly alienated by the unseasonable arrogance of
Bajazet; the complaints of his enemies, the Anatolian princes, were just
and vehement; and Timour betrayed a design of leading his royal captive
in triumph to Samarcand. An attempt to facilitate his escape, by digging
a mine under the tent, provoked the Mogul emperor to impose a harsher
restraint; and in his perpetual marches, an iron cage on a wagon might
be invented, not as a wanton insult, but as a rigorous precaution.
Timour had read in some fabulous history a similar treatment of one of
his predecessors, a king of Persia; and Bajazet was condemned to
represent the person, and expiate the guilt, of the Roman Cæsar ^58 ^*
But the strength of his mind and body fainted under the trial, and his
premature death might, without injustice, be ascribed to the severity of
Timour. He warred not with the dead: a tear and a sepulchre were all
that he could bestow on a captive who was delivered from his power; and
if Mousa, the son of Bajazet, was permitted to reign over the ruins of
Boursa, the greatest part of the province of Anatolia had been restored
by the conqueror to their lawful sovereigns.

[Footnote 58: Sapor, king of Persia, had been made prisoner, and
enclosed in the figure of a cow's hide by Maximian or Galerius Cæsar.
Such is the fable related by Eutychius, (Annal. tom. i. p. 421, vers.
Pocock. The recollection of the true history (Decline and Fall, &c.,
vol. ii. p 140--152) will teach us to appreciate the knowledge of the
Orientals of the ages which precede the Hegira.]

[Footnote *: Von Hammer's explanation of this contested point is both
simple and satisfactory. It originates in a mistake in the meaning of
the Turkish word kafe, which means a covered litter or palanquin drawn
by two horses, and is generally used to convey the harem of an Eastern
monarch. In such a litter, with the lattice-work made of iron, Bajazet
either chose or was constrained to travel. This was either mistaken for,
or transformed by, ignorant relaters into a cage. The European
Schiltberger, the two oldest of the Turkish historians, and the most
valuable of the later compilers, Seadeddin, describe this litter.
Seadeddin discusses the question with some degree of historical
criticism, and ascribes the choice of such a vehicle to the indignant
state of Bajazet's mind, which would not brook the sight of his Tartar
conquerors. Von Hammer, p. 320. -- M.]

From the Irtish and Volga to the Persian Gulf, and from the Ganges to
Damascus and the Archipelago, Asia was in the hand of Timour: his armies
were invincible, his ambition was boundless, and his zeal might aspire
to conquer and convert the Christian kingdoms of the West, which already
trembled at his name. He touched the utmost verge of the land; but an
insuperable, though narrow, sea rolled between the two continents of
Europe and Asia; ^59 and the lord of so many tomans, or myriads, of
horse, was not master of a single galley. The two passages of the
Bosphorus and Hellespont, of Constantinople and Gallipoli, were
possessed, the one by the Christians, the other by the Turks. On this
great occasion, they forgot the difference of religion, to act with
union and firmness in the common cause: the double straits were guarded
with ships and fortifications; and they separately withheld the
transports which Timour demanded of either nation, under the pretence of
attacking their enemy. At the same time, they soothed his pride with
tributary gifts and suppliant embassies, and prudently tempted him to
retreat with the honors of victory. Soliman, the son of Bajazet,
implored his clemency for his father and himself; accepted, by a red
patent, the investiture of the kingdom of Romania, which he already held
by the sword; and reiterated his ardent wish, of casting himself in
person at the feet of the king of the world. The Greek emperor ^60
(either John or Manuel) submitted to pay the same tribute which he had
stipulated with the Turkish sultan, and ratified the treaty by an oath
of allegiance, from which he could absolve his conscience so soon as the
Mogul arms had retired from Anatolia. But the fears and fancy of nations
ascribed to the ambitious Tamerlane a new design of vast and romantic
compass; a design of subduing Egypt and Africa, marching from the Nile
to the Atlantic Ocean, entering Europe by the Straits of Gibraltar, and,
after imposing his yoke on the kingdoms of Christendom, of returning
home by the deserts of Russia and Tartary. This remote, and perhaps
imaginary, danger was averted by the submission of the sultan of Egypt:
the honors of the prayer and the coin attested at Cairo the supremacy of
Timour; and a rare gift of a giraffe, or camelopard, and nine ostriches,
represented at Samarcand the tribute of the African world. Our
imagination is not less astonished by the portrait of a Mogul, who, in
his camp before Smyrna, meditates, and almost accomplishes, the invasion
of the Chinese empire. ^61 Timour was urged to this enterprise by
national honor and religious zeal. The torrents which he had shed of
Mussulman blood could be expiated only by an equal destruction of the
infidels; and as he now stood at the gates of paradise, he might best
secure his glorious entrance by demolishing the idols of China, founding
mosques in every city, and establishing the profession of faith in one
God, and his prophet Mahomet. The recent expulsion of the house of
Zingis was an insult on the Mogul name; and the disorders of the empire
afforded the fairest opportunity for revenge. The illustrious Hongvou,
founder of the dynasty of Ming, died four years before the battle of
Angora; and his grandson, a weak and unfortunate youth, was burnt in his
palace, after a million of Chinese had perished in the civil war. ^62
Before he evacuated Anatolia, Timour despatched beyond the Sihoon a
numerous army, or rather colony, of his old and new subjects, to open
the road, to subdue the Pagan Calmucks and Mungals, and to found cities
and magazines in the desert; and, by the diligence of his lieutenant, he
soon received a perfect map and description of the unknown regions, from
the source of the Irtish to the wall of China. During these
preparations, the emperor achieved the final conquest of Georgia; passed
the winter on the banks of the Araxes; appeased the troubles of Persia;
and slowly returned to his capital, after a campaign of four years and
nine months.

[Footnote 59: Arabshah (tom. ii. c. 25) describes, like a curious
traveller, the Straits of Gallipoli and Constantinople. To acquire a
just idea of these events, I have compared the narratives and prejudices
of the Moguls, Turks, Greeks, and Arabians. The Spanish ambassador
mentions this hostile union of the Christians and Ottomans, (Vie de
Timour, p. 96.)]

[Footnote 60: Since the name of Cæsar had been transferred to the
sultans of Roum, the Greek princes of Constantinople (Sherefeddin, l. v.
c. 54 were confounded with the Christian lordsof Gallipoli,
Thessalonica, &c. under the title of Tekkur, which is derived by
corruption from the genitive tou kuriou, (Cantemir, p. 51.)]

[Footnote 61: See Sherefeddin, l. v. c. 4, who marks, in a just
itinerary, the road to China, which Arabshah (tom. ii. c. 33) paints in
vague and rhetorical colors.]

[Footnote 62: Synopsis Hist. Sinicæ, p. 74--76, (in the ivth part of the
Relations de Thevenot,) Duhalde, Hist. de la Chine, (tom. i. p. 507,
508, folio edition;) and for the Chronology of the Chinese emperors, De
Guignes, Hist. des Huns, (tom. i. p. 71, 72.)]

Chapter LXV: Elevation Of Timour Or Tamerlane, And His Death. -- Part
III.

On the throne of Samarcand, ^63 he displayed, in a short repose, his
magnificence and power; listened to the complaints of the people;
distributed a just measure of rewards and punishments; employed his
riches in the architecture of palaces and temples; and gave audience to
the ambassadors of Egypt, Arabia, India, Tartary, Russia, and Spain, the
last of whom presented a suit of tapestry which eclipsed the pencil of
the Oriental artists. The marriage of six of the emperor's grandsons was
esteemed an act of religion as well as of paternal tenderness; and the
pomp of the ancient caliphs was revived in their nuptials. They were
celebrated in the gardens of Canighul, decorated with innumerable tents
and pavilions, which displayed the luxury of a great city and the spoils
of a victorious camp. Whole forests were cut down to supply fuel for the
kitchens; the plain was spread with pyramids of meat, and vases of every
liquor, to which thousands of guests were courteously invited: the
orders of the state, and the nations of the earth, were marshalled at
the royal banquet; nor were the ambassadors of Europe (says the haughty
Persian) excluded from the feast; since even the casses, the smallest of
fish, find their place in the ocean. ^64 The public joy was testified by
illuminations and masquerades; the trades of Samarcand passed in review;
and every trade was emulous to execute some quaint device, some
marvellous pageant, with the materials of their peculiar art. After the
marriage contracts had been ratified by the cadhis, the bride-grooms and
their brides retired to the nuptial chambers: nine times, according to
the Asiatic fashion, they were dressed and undressed; and at each change
of apparel, pearls and rubies were showered on their heads, and
contemptuously abandoned to their attendants. A general indulgence was
proclaimed: every law was relaxed, every pleasure was allowed; the
people was free, the sovereign was idle; and the historian of Timour may
remark, that, after devoting fifty years to the attainment of empire,
the only happy period of his life were the two months in which he ceased
to exercise his power. But he was soon awakened to the cares of
government and war. The standard was unfurled for the invasion of China:
the emirs made their report of two hundred thousand, the select and
veteran soldiers of Iran and Touran: their baggage and provisions were
transported by five hundred great wagons, and an immense train of horses
and camels; and the troops might prepare for a long absence, since more
than six months were employed in the tranquil journey of a caravan from
Samarcand to Pekin. Neither age, nor the severity of the winter, could
retard the impatience of Timour; he mounted on horseback, passed the
Sihoon on the ice, marched seventy-six parasangs, three hundred miles,
from his capital, and pitched his last camp in the neighborhood of
Otrar, where he was expected by the angel of death. Fatigue, and the
indiscreet use of iced water, accelerated the progress of his fever; and
the conqueror of Asia expired in the seventieth year of his age,
thirty-five years after he had ascended the throne of Zagatai. His
designs were lost; his armies were disbanded; China was saved; and
fourteen years after his decease, the most powerful of his children sent
an embassy of friendship and commerce to the court of Pekin. ^65

[Footnote 63: For the return, triumph, and death of Timour, see
Sherefeddin (l. vi. c. 1--30) and Arabshah, (tom. ii. c. 36--47.)]

[Footnote 64: Sherefeddin (l. vi. c. 24) mentions the ambassadors of one
of the most potent sovereigns of Europe. We know that it was Henry III.
king of Castile; and the curious relation of his two embassies is still
extant, (Mariana, Hist. Hispan. l. xix. c. 11, tom. ii. p. 329, 330.
Avertissement àl'Hist. de Timur Bec, p. 28--33.) There appears likewise
to have been some correspondence between the Mogul emperor and the court
of Charles VII. king of France, (Histoire de France, par Velly et
Villaret, tom. xii. p. 336.)]

[Footnote 65: See the translation of the Persian account of their
embassy, a curious and original piece, (in the ivth part of the
Relations de Thevenot.) They presented the emperor of China with an old
horse which Timour had formerly rode. It was in the year 1419 that they
departed from the court of Herat, to which place they returned in 1422
from Pekin.]

The fame of Timour has pervaded the East and West: his posterity is
still invested with the Imperial title; and the admiration of his
subjects, who revered him almost as a deity, may be justified in some
degree by the praise or confession of his bitterest enemies. ^66
Although he was lame of a hand and foot, his form and stature were not
unworthy of his rank; and his vigorous health, so essential to himself
and to the world, was corroborated by temperance and exercise. In his
familiar discourse he was grave and modest, and if he was ignorant of
the Arabic language, he spoke with fluency and elegance the Persian and
Turkish idioms. It was his delight to converse with the learned on
topics of history and science; and the amusement of his leisure hours
was the game of chess, which he improved or corrupted with new
refinements. ^67 In his religion he was a zealous, though not perhaps an
orthodox, Mussulman; ^68 but his sound understanding may tempt us to
believe, that a superstitious reverence for omens and prophecies, for
saints and astrologers, was only affected as an instrument of policy. In
the government of a vast empire, he stood alone and absolute, without a
rebel to oppose his power, a favorite to seduce his affections, or a
minister to mislead his judgment. It was his firmest maxim, that
whatever might be the consequence, the word of the prince should never
be disputed or recalled; but his foes have maliciously observed, that
the commands of anger and destruction were more strictly executed than
those of beneficence and favor. His sons and grandsons, of whom Timour
left six-and-thirty at his decease, were his first and most submissive
subjects; and whenever they deviated from their duty, they were
corrected, according to the laws of Zingis, with the bastinade, and
afterwards restored to honor and command. Perhaps his heart was not
devoid of the social virtues; perhaps he was not incapable of loving his
friends and pardoning his enemies; but the rules of morality are founded
on the public interest; and it may be sufficient to applaud the wisdomof
a monarch, for the liberality by which he is not impoverished, and for
the justice by which he is strengthened and enriched. To maintain the
harmony of authority and obedience, to chastise the proud, to protect
the weak, to reward the deserving, to banish vice and idleness from his
dominions, to secure the traveller and merchant, to restrain the
depredations of the soldier, to cherish the labors of the husbandman, to
encourage industry and learning, and, by an equal and moderate
assessment, to increase the revenue, without increasing the taxes, are
indeed the duties of a prince; but, in the discharge of these duties, he
finds an ample and immediate recompense. Timour might boast, that, at
his accession to the throne, Asia was the prey of anarchy and rapine,
whilst under his prosperous monarchy a child, fearless and unhurt, might
carry a purse of gold from the East to the West. Such was his confidence
of merit, that from this reformation he derived an excuse for his
victories, and a title to universal dominion. The four following
observations will serve to appreciate his claim to the public gratitude;
and perhaps we shall conclude, that the Mogul emperor was rather the
scourge than the benefactor of mankind. 1.If some partial disorders,
some local oppressions, were healed by the sword of Timour, the remedy
was far more pernicious than the disease. By their rapine, cruelty, and
discord, the petty tyrants of Persia might afflict their subjects; but
whole nations were crushed under the footsteps of the reformer. The
ground which had been occupied by flourishing cities was often marked by
his abominable trophies, by columns, or pyramids, of human heads.
Astracan, Carizme, Delhi, Ispahan, Bagdad, Aleppo, Damascus, Boursa,
Smyrna, and a thousand others, were sacked, or burnt, or utterly
destroyed, in his presence, and by his troops: and perhaps his
conscience would have been startled, if a priest or philosopher had
dared to number the millions of victims whom he had sacrificed to the
establishment of peace and order. ^69 2.His most destructive wars were
rather inroads than conquests. He invaded Turkestan, Kipzak, Russia,
Hindostan, Syria, Anatolia, Armenia, and Georgia, without a hope or a
desire of preserving those distant provinces. From thence he departed
laden with spoil; but he left behind him neither troops to awe the
contumacious, nor magistrates to protect the obedient, natives. When he
had broken the fabric of their ancient government, he abandoned them to
the evils which his invasion had aggravated or caused; nor were these
evils compensated by any present or possible benefits. 3.The kingdoms of
Transoxiana and Persia were the proper field which he labored to
cultivate and adorn, as the perpetual inheritance of his family. But his
peaceful labors were often interrupted, and sometimes blasted, by the
absence of the conqueror. While he triumphed on the Volga or the Ganges,
his servants, and even his sons, forgot their master and their duty. The
public and private injuries were poorly redressed by the tardy rigor of
inquiry and punishment; and we must be content to praise the
Institutionsof Timour, as the specious idea of a perfect monarchy.
4.Whatsoever might be the blessings of his administration, they
evaporated with his life. To reign, rather than to govern, was the
ambition of his children and grandchildren; ^70 the enemies of each
other and of the people. A fragment of the empire was upheld with some
glory by Sharokh, his youngest son; but after hisdecease, the scene was
again involved in darkness and blood; and before the end of a century,
Transoxiana and Persia were trampled by the Uzbeks from the north, and
the Turkmans of the black and white sheep. The race of Timour would have
been extinct, if a hero, his descendant in the fifth degree, had not
fled before the Uzbek arms to the conquest of Hindostan. His successors
(the great Moguls ^71) extended their sway from the mountains of Cashmir
to Cape Comorin, and from Candahar to the Gulf of Bengal. Since the
reign of Aurungzebe, their empire had been dissolved; their treasures of
Delhi have been rifled by a Persian robber; and the richest of their
kingdoms is now possessed by a company of Christian merchants, of a
remote island in the Northern Ocean.

[Footnote 66: From Arabshah, tom. ii. c. 96. The bright or softer colors
are borrowed from Sherefeddin, D'Herbelot, and the Institutions.]

[Footnote 67: His new system was multiplied from 32 pieces and 64
squares to 56 pieces and 110 or 130 squares; but, except in his court,
the old game has been thought sufficiently elaborate. The Mogul emperor
was rather pleased than hurt with the victory of a subject: a chess
player will feel the value of this encomium!]

[Footnote 68: See Sherefeddin, l. v. c. 15, 25. Arabshah tom. ii. c. 96,
p. 801, 803) approves the impiety of Timour and the Moguls, who almost
preferred to the Koran the Yacsa, or Law of Zingis, (cui Deus
maledicat;) nor will he believe that Sharokh had abolished the use and
authority of that Pagan code.]

[Footnote 69: Besides the bloody passages of this narrative, I must
refer to an anticipation in the third volume of the Decline and Fall,
which in a single note (p. 234, note 25) accumulates nearly 300,000
heads of the monuments of his cruelty. Except in Rowe's play on the
fifth of November, I did not expect to hear of Timour's amiable
moderation (White's preface, p. 7.) Yet I can excuse a generous
enthusiasm in the reader, and still more in the editor, of the
Institutions.]

[Footnote 70: Consult the last chapters of Sherefeddin and Arabshah, and
M. De Guignes, (Hist. des Huns, tom. iv. l. xx.) Fraser's History of
Nadir Shah, (p. 1--62.) The story of Timour's descendants is imperfectly
told; and the second and third parts of Sherefeddin are unknown.]

[Footnote 71: Shah Allum, the present Mogul, is in the fourteenth degree
from Timour, by Miran Shah, his third son. See the second volume of
Dow's History of Hindostan.]

Far different was the fate of the Ottoman monarchy. The massy trunk was
bent to the ground, but no sooner did the hurricane pass away, than it
again rose with fresh vigor and more lively vegetation. When Timour, in
every sense, had evacuated Anatolia, he left the cities without a
palace, a treasure, or a king. The open country was overspread with
hordes of shepherds and robbers of Tartar or Turkman origin; the recent
conquests of Bajazet were restored to the emirs, one of whom, in base
revenge, demolished his sepulchre; and his five sons were eager, by
civil discord, to consume the remnant of their patrimony. I shall
enumerate their names in the order of their age and actions. ^72 1.It is
doubtful, whether I relate the story of the true Mustapha, or of an
impostor who personated that lost prince. He fought by his father's side
in the battle of Angora: but when the captive sultan was permitted to
inquire for his children, Mousa alone could be found; and the Turkish
historians, the slaves of the triumphant faction, are persuaded that his
brother was confounded among the slain. If Mustapha escaped from that
disastrous field, he was concealed twelve years from his friends and
enemies; till he emerged in Thessaly, and was hailed by a numerous
party, as the son and successor of Bajazet. His first defeat would have
been his last, had not the true, or false, Mustapha been saved by the
Greeks, and restored, after the decease of his brother Mahomet, to
liberty and empire. A degenerate mind seemed to argue his spurious
birth; and if, on the throne of Adrianople, he was adored as the Ottoman
sultan, his flight, his fetters, and an ignominious gibbet, delivered
the impostor to popular contempt. A similar character and claim was
asserted by several rival pretenders: thirty persons are said to have
suffered under the name of Mustapha; and these frequent executions may
perhaps insinuate, that the Turkish court was not perfectly secure of
the death of the lawful prince.2.After his father's captivity, Isa ^73
reigned for some time in the neighborhood of Angora, Sinope, and the
Black Sea; and his ambassadors were dismissed from the presence of
Timour with fair promises and honorable gifts. But their master was soon
deprived of his province and life, by a jealous brother, the sovereign
of Amasia; and the final event suggested a pious allusion, that the law
of Moses and Jesus, of Isaand Mousa, had been abrogated by the greater
Mahomet. 3.Solimanis not numbered in the list of the Turkish emperors:
yet he checked the victorious progress of the Moguls; and after their
departure, united for a while the thrones of Adrianople and Boursa. In
war he was brave, active, and fortunate; his courage was softened by
clemency; but it was likewise inflamed by presumption, and corrupted by
intemperance and idleness. He relaxed the nerves of discipline, in a
government where either the subject or the sovereign must continually
tremble: his vices alienated the chiefs of the army and the law; and his
daily drunkenness, so contemptible in a prince and a man, was doubly
odious in a disciple of the prophet. In the slumber of intoxication he
was surprised by his brother Mousa; and as he fled from Adrianople
towards the Byzantine capital, Soliman was overtaken and slain in a
bath, ^* after a reign of seven years and ten months. 4.The investiture
of Mousa degraded him as the slave of the Moguls: his tributary kingdom
of Anatolia was confined within a narrow limit, nor could his broken
militia and empty treasury contend with the hardy and veteran bands of
the sovereign of Romania. Mousa fled in disguise from the palace of
Boursa; traversed the Propontis in an open boat; wandered over the
Walachian and Servian hills; and after some vain attempts, ascended the
throne of Adrianople, so recently stained with the blood of Soliman. In
a reign of three years and a half, his troops were victorious against
the Christians of Hungary and the Morea; but Mousa was ruined by his
timorous disposition and unseasonable clemency. After resigning the
sovereignty of Anatolia, he fell a victim to the perfidy of his
ministers, and the superior ascendant of his brother Mahomet. 5.The
final victory of Mahomet was the just recompense of his prudence and
moderation. Before his father's captivity, the royal youth had been
intrusted with the government of Amasia, thirty days' journey from
Constantinople, and the Turkish frontier against the Christians of
Trebizond and Georgia. The castle, in Asiatic warfare, was esteemed
impregnable; and the city of Amasia, ^74 which is equally divided by the
River Iris, rises on either side in the form of an amphitheatre, and
represents on a smaller scale the image of Bagdad. In his rapid career,
Timour appears to have overlooked this obscure and contumacious angle of
Anatolia; and Mahomet, without provoking the conqueror, maintained his
silent independence, and chased from the province the last stragglers of
the Tartar host. ^! He relieved himself from the dangerous neighborhood
of Isa; but in the contests of their more powerful brethren his firm
neutrality was respected; till, after the triumph of Mousa, he stood
forth the heir and avenger of the unfortunate Soliman. Mahomet obtained
Anatolia by treaty, and Romania by arms; and the soldier who presented
him with the head of Mousa was rewarded as the benefactor of his king
and country. The eight years of his sole and peaceful reign were
usefully employed in banishing the vices of civil discord, and restoring
on a firmer basis the fabric of the Ottoman monarchy. His last care was
the choice of two viziers, Bajazet and Ibrahim, ^75 who might guide the
youth of his son Amurath; and such was their union and prudence, that
they concealed above forty days the emperor's death, till the arrival of
his successor in the palace of Boursa. A new war was kindled in Europe
by the prince, or impostor, Mustapha; the first vizier lost his army and
his head; but the more fortunate Ibrahim, whose name and family are
still revered, extinguished the last pretender to the throne of Bajazet,
and closed the scene of domestic hostility.

[Footnote 72: The civil wars, from the death of Bajazet to that of
Mustapha, are related, according to the Turks, by Demetrius Cantemir,
(p. 58--82.) Of the Greeks, Chalcondyles, (l. iv. and v.,) Phranza, (l.
i. c. 30--32,) and Ducas, (c. 18--27, the last is the most copious and
best informed.]

[Footnote 73: Arabshah, (tom. ii. c. 26,) whose testimony on this
occasion is weighty and valuable. The existence of Isa (unknown to the
Turks) is likewise confirmed by Sherefeddin, (l. v. c. 57.)]

[Footnote *: He escaped from the bath, and fled towards Constantinople.
Five mothers from a village, Dugundschi, whose inhabitants had suffered
severely from the exactions of his officers, recognized and followed
him. Soliman shot two of them, the others discharged their arrows in
their turn the sultan fell and his head was cut off. V. Hammer, vol. i.
p. 349. -- M.]

[Footnote 74: Arabshah, loc. citat. Abulfeda, Geograph. tab. xvii. p.
302. Busbequius, epist. i. p. 96, 97, in Itinere C. P. et Amasiano.]

[Footnote !: See his nine battles. V. Hammer, p. 339. -- M.]

[Footnote 75: The virtues of Ibrahim are praised by a contemporary
Greek, (Ducas, c. 25.) His descendants are the sole nobles in Turkey:
they content themselves with the administration of his pious
foundations, are excused from public offices, and receive two annual
visits from the sultan, (Cantemir, p. 76.)]

In these conflicts, the wisest Turks, and indeed the body of the nation,
were strongly attached to the unity of the empire; and Romania and
Anatolia, so often torn asunder by private ambition, were animated by a
strong and invincible tendency of cohesion. Their efforts might have
instructed the Christian powers; and had they occupied, with a
confederate fleet, the Straits of Gallipoli, the Ottomans, at least in
Europe, must have been speedily annihilated. But the schism of the West,
and the factions and wars of France and England, diverted the Latins
from this generous enterprise: they enjoyed the present respite, without
a thought of futurity; and were often tempted by a momentary interest to
serve the common enemy of their religion. A colony of Genoese, ^76 which
had been planted at Phocæa ^77 on the Ionian coast, was enriched by the
lucrative monopoly of alum; ^78 and their tranquillity, under the
Turkish empire, was secured by the annual payment of tribute. In the
last civil war of the Ottomans, the Genoese governor, Adorno, a bold and
ambitious youth, embraced the party of Amurath; and undertook, with
seven stout galleys, to transport him from Asia to Europe. The sultan
and five hundred guards embarked on board the admiral's ship; which was
manned by eight hundred of the bravest Franks. His life and liberty were
in their hands; nor can we, without reluctance, applaud the fidelity of
Adorno, who, in the midst of the passage, knelt before him, and
gratefully accepted a discharge of his arrears of tribute. They landed
in sight of Mustapha and Gallipoli; two thousand Italians, armed with
lances and battle-axes, attended Amurath to the conquest of Adrianople;
and this venal service was soon repaid by the ruin of the commerce and
colony of Phocæa.

[Footnote 76: See Pachymer, (l. v. c. 29,) Nicephorus Gregoras, (l. ii.
c. 1,) Sherefeddin, (l. v. c. 57,) and Ducas, (c. 25.) The last of
these, a curious and careful observer, is entitled, from his birth and
station, to particular credit in all that concerns Ionia and the
islands. Among the nations that resorted to New Phocæa, he mentions the
English; ('Igglhnoi;) an early evidence of Mediterranean trade.]

[Footnote 77: For the spirit of navigation, and freedom of ancient
Phocæa, or rather the Phocæans, consult the first book of Herodotus, and
the Geographical Index of his last and learned French translator, M.
Larcher (tom. vii. p. 299.)]

[Footnote 78: Phocæa is not enumerated by Pliny (Hist. Nat. xxxv. 52)
among the places productive of alum: he reckons Egypt as the first, and
for the second the Isle of Melos, whose alum mines are described by
Tournefort, (tom. i. lettre iv.,) a traveller and a naturalist. After
the loss of Phocæa, the Genoese, in 1459, found that useful mineral in
the Isle of Ischia, (Ismael. Bouillaud, ad Ducam, c. 25.)]

If Timour had generously marched at the request, and to the relief, of
the Greek emperor, he might be entitled to the praise and gratitude of
the Christians. ^79 But a Mussulman, who carried into Georgia the sword
of persecution, and respected the holy warfare of Bajazet, was not
disposed to pity or succor the idolatersof Europe. The Tartar followed
the impulse of ambition; and the deliverance of Constantinople was the
accidental consequence. When Manuel abdicated the government, it was his
prayer, rather than his hope, that the ruin of the church and state
might be delayed beyond his unhappy days; and after his return from a
western pilgrimage, he expected every hour the news of the sad
catastrophe. On a sudden, he was astonished and rejoiced by the
intelligence of the retreat, the overthrow, and the captivity of the
Ottoman. Manuel ^80 immediately sailed from Modon in the Morea; ascended
the throne of Constantinople, and dismissed his blind competitor to an
easy exile in the Isle of Lesbos. The ambassadors of the son of Bajazet
were soon introduced to his presence; but their pride was fallen, their
tone was modest: they were awed by the just apprehension, lest the
Greeks should open to the Moguls the gates of Europe. Soliman saluted
the emperor by the name of father; solicited at his hands the government
or gift of Romania; and promised to deserve his favor by inviolable
friendship, and the restitution of Thessalonica, with the most important
places along the Strymon, the Propontis, and the Black Sea. The alliance
of Soliman exposed the emperor to the enmity and revenge of Mousa: the
Turks appeared in arms before the gates of Constantinople; but they were
repulsed by sea and land; and unless the city was guarded by some
foreign mercenaries, the Greeks must have wondered at their own triumph.
But, instead of prolonging the division of the Ottoman powers, the
policy or passion of Manuel was tempted to assist the most formidable of
the sons of Bajazet. He concluded a treaty with Mahomet, whose progress
was checked by the insuperable barrier of Gallipoli: the sultan and his
troops were transported over the Bosphorus; he was hospitably
entertained in the capital; and his successful sally was the first step
to the conquest of Romania. The ruin was suspended by the prudence and
moderation of the conqueror: he faithfully discharged his own
obligations and those of Soliman, respected the laws of gratitude and
peace; and left the emperor guardian of his two younger sons, in the
vain hope of saving them from the jealous cruelty of their brother
Amurath. But the execution of his last testament would have offended the
national honor and religion; and the divan unanimously pronounced, that
the royal youths should never be abandoned to the custody and education
of a Christian dog. On this refusal, the Byzantine councils were
divided; but the age and caution of Manuel yielded to the presumption of
his son John; and they unsheathed a dangerous weapon of revenge, by
dismissing the true or false Mustapha, who had long been detained as a
captive and hostage, and for whose maintenance they received an annual
pension of three hundred thousand aspers. ^81 At the door of his prison,
Mustapha subscribed to every proposal; and the keys of Gallipoli, or
rather of Europe, were stipulated as the price of his deliverance. But
no sooner was he seated on the throne of Romania, than he dismissed the
Greek ambassadors with a smile of contempt, declaring, in a pious tone,
that, at the day of judgment, he would rather answer for the violation
of an oath, than for the surrender of a Mussulman city into the hands of
the infidels. The emperor was at once the enemy of the two rivals; from
whom he had sustained, and to whom he had offered, an injury; and the
victory of Amurath was followed, in the ensuing spring, by the siege of
Constantinople. ^82

[Footnote 79: The writer who has the most abused this fabulous
generosity, is our ingenious Sir William Temple, (his Works, vol. iii.
p. 349, 350, octavo edition,) that lover of exotic virtue. After the
conquest of Russia, &c., and the passage of the Danube, his Tartar hero
relieves, visits, admires, and refuses the city of Constantine. His
flattering pencil deviates in every line from the truth of history; yet
his pleasing fictions are more excusable than the gross errors of
Cantemir.]

[Footnote 80: For the reigns of Manuel and John, of Mahomet I. and
Amurath II., see the Othman history of Cantemir, (p. 70--95,) and the
three Greeks, Chalcondyles, Phranza, and Ducas, who is still superior to
his rivals.]

[Footnote 81: The Turkish asper (from the Greek asproV) is, or was, a
piece of whiteor silver money, at present much debased, but which was
formerly equivalent to the 54th part, at least, of a Venetian ducat or
sequin; and the 300,000 aspers, a princely allowance or royal tribute,
may be computed at 2500l. sterling, (Leunclav. Pandect. Turc. p.
406--408.) *

Note: * According to Von Hammer, this calculation is much too low. The
asper was a century before the time of which writes, the tenth part of a
ducat; for the same tribute which the Byzantine writers state at 300,000
aspers the Ottomans state at 30,000 ducats, about 15000l Note, vol. p.
636. -- M.]

[Footnote 82: For the siege of Constantinople in 1422, see the
particular and contemporary narrative of John Cananus, published by Leo
Allatius, at the end of his edition of Acropolita, (p. 188--199.)]

The religious merit of subduing the city of the Cæsars attracted from
Asia a crowd of volunteers, who aspired to the crown of martyrdom: their
military ardor was inflamed by the promise of rich spoils and beautiful
females; and the sultan's ambition was consecrated by the presence and
prediction of Seid Bechar, a descendant of the prophet, ^83 who arrived
in the camp, on a mule, with a venerable train of five hundred
disciples. But he might blush, if a fanatic could blush, at the failure
of his assurances. The strength of the walls resisted an army of two
hundred thousand Turks; their assaults were repelled by the sallies of
the Greeks and their foreign mercenaries; the old resources of defence
were opposed to the new engines of attack; and the enthusiasm of the
dervis, who was snatched to heaven in visionary converse with Mahomet,
was answered by the credulity of the Christians, who beheldthe Virgin
Mary, in a violet garment, walking on the rampart and animating their
courage. ^84 After a siege of two months, Amurath was recalled to Boursa
by a domestic revolt, which had been kindled by Greek treachery, and was
soon extinguished by the death of a guiltless brother. While he led his
Janizaries to new conquests in Europe and Asia, the Byzantine empire was
indulged in a servile and precarious respite of thirty years. Manuel
sank into the grave; and John Palæologus was permitted to reign, for an
annual tribute of three hundred thousand aspers, and the dereliction of
almost all that he held beyond the suburbs of Constantinople.

[Footnote 83: Cantemir, p. 80. Cananus, who describes Seid Bechar,
without naming him, supposes that the friend of Mahomet assumed in his
amours the privilege of a prophet, and that the fairest of the Greek
nuns were promised to the saint and his disciples.]

[Footnote 84: For this miraculous apparition, Cananus appeals to the
Mussulman saint; but who will bear testimony for Seid Bechar?]

In the establishment and restoration of the Turkish empire, the first
merit must doubtless be assigned to the personal qualities of the
sultans; since, in human life, the most important scenes will depend on
the character of a single actor. By some shades of wisdom and virtue,
they may be discriminated from each other; but, except in a single
instance, a period of nine reigns, and two hundred and sixty-five years,
is occupied, from the elevation of Othman to the death of Soliman, by a
rare series of warlike and active princes, who impressed their subjects
with obedience and their enemies with terror. Instead of the slothful
luxury of the seraglio, the heirs of royalty were educated in the
council and the field: from early youth they were intrusted by their
fathers with the command of provinces and armies; and this manly
institution, which was often productive of civil war, must have
essentially contributed to the discipline and vigor of the monarchy. The
Ottomans cannot style themselves, like the Arabian caliphs, the
descendants or successors of the apostle of God; and the kindred which
they claim with the Tartar khans of the house of Zingis appears to be
founded in flattery rather than in truth. ^85 Their origin is obscure;
but their sacred and indefeasible right, which no time can erase, and no
violence can infringe, was soon and unalterably implanted in the minds
of their subjects. A weak or vicious sultan may be deposed and
strangled; but his inheritance devolves to an infant or an idiot: nor
has the most daring rebel presumed to ascend the throne of his lawful
sovereign. ^86

[Footnote 85: See Ricaut, (l. i. c. 13.) The Turkish sultans assume the
title of khan. Yet Abulghazi is ignorant of his Ottoman cousins.]

[Footnote 86: The third grand vizier of the name of Kiuperli, who was
slain at the battle of Salankanen in 1691, (Cantemir, p. 382,) presumed
to say that all the successors of Soliman had been fools or tyrants, and
that it was time to abolish the race, (Marsigli Stato Militaire, &c., p.
28.) This political heretic was a good Whig, and justified against the
French ambassador the revolution of England, (Mignot, Hist. des
Ottomans, tom. iii. p. 434.) His presumption condemns the singular
exception of continuing offices in the same family.]

While the transient dynasties of Asia have been continually subverted by
a crafty vizier in the palace, or a victorious general in the camp, the
Ottoman succession has been confirmed by the practice of five centuries,
and is now incorporated with the vital principle of the Turkish nation.

To the spirit and constitution of that nation, a strong and singular
influence may, however, be ascribed. The primitive subjects of Othman
were the four hundred families of wandering Turkmans, who had followed
his ancestors from the Oxus to the Sangar; and the plains of Anatolia
are still covered with the white and black tents of their rustic
brethren. But this original drop was dissolved in the mass of voluntary
and vanquished subjects, who, under the name of Turks, are united by the
common ties of religion, language, and manners. In the cities, from
Erzeroum to Belgrade, that national appellation is common to all the
Moslems, the first and most honorable inhabitants; but they have
abandoned, at least in Romania, the villages, and the cultivation of the
land, to the Christian peasants. In the vigorous age of the Ottoman
government, the Turks were themselves excluded from all civil and
military honors; and a servile class, an artificial people, was raised
by the discipline of education to obey, to conquer, and to command. ^87
From the time of Orchan and the first Amurath, the sultans were
persuaded that a government of the sword must be renewed in each
generation with new soldiers; and that such soldiers must be sought, not
in effeminate Asia, but among the hardy and warlike natives of Europe.
The provinces of Thrace, Macedonia, Albania, Bulgaria, and Servia,
became the perpetual seminary of the Turkish army; and when the royal
fifth of the captives was diminished by conquest, an inhuman tax of the
fifth child, or of every fifth year, was rigorously levied on the
Christian families. At the age of twelve or fourteen years, the most
robust youths were torn from their parents; their names were enrolled in
a book; and from that moment they were clothed, taught, and maintained,
for the public service. According to the promise of their appearance,
they were selected for the royal schools of Boursa, Pera, and
Adrianople, intrusted to the care of the bashaws, or dispersed in the
houses of the Anatolian peasantry. It was the first care of their
masters to instruct them in the Turkish language: their bodies were
exercised by every labor that could fortify their strength; they learned
to wrestle, to leap, to run, to shoot with the bow, and afterwards with
the musket; till they were drafted into the chambers and companies of
the Janizaries, and severely trained in the military or monastic
discipline of the order. The youths most conspicuous for birth, talents,
and beauty, were admitted into the inferior class of Agiamoglans, or the
more liberal rank of Ichoglans, of whom the former were attached to the
palace, and the latter to the person, of the prince. In four successive
schools, under the rod of the white eunuchs, the arts of horsemanship
and of darting the javelin were their daily exercise, while those of a
more studious cast applied themselves to the study of the Koran, and the
knowledge of the Arabic and Persian tongues. As they advanced in
seniority and merit, they were gradually dismissed to military, civil,
and even ecclesiastical employments: the longer their stay, the higher
was their expectation; till, at a mature period, they were admitted into
the number of the forty agas, who stood before the sultan, and were
promoted by his choice to the government of provinces and the first
honors of the empire. ^88 Such a mode of institution was admirably
adapted to the form and spirit of a despotic monarchy. The ministers and
generals were, in the strictest sense, the slaves of the emperor, to
whose bounty they were indebted for their instruction and support. When
they left the seraglio, and suffered their beards to grow as the symbol
of enfranchisement, they found themselves in an important office,
without faction or friendship, without parents and without heirs,
dependent on the hand which had raised them from the dust, and which, on
the slightest displeasure, could break in pieces these statues of glass,
as they were aptly termed by the Turkish proverb. ^89 In the slow and
painful steps of education, their characters and talents were unfolded
to a discerning eye: the man, naked and alone, was reduced to the
standard of his personal merit; and, if the sovereign had wisdom to
choose, he possessed a pure and boundless liberty of choice. The Ottoman
candidates were trained by the virtues of abstinence to those of action;
by the habits of submission to those of command. A similar spirit was
diffused among the troops; and their silence and sobriety, their
patience and modesty, have extorted the reluctant praise of their
Christian enemies. ^90 Nor can the victory appear doubtful, if we
compare the discipline and exercise of the Janizaries with the pride of
birth, the independence of chivalry, the ignorance of the new levies,
the mutinous temper of the veterans, and the vices of intemperance and
disorder, which so long contaminated the armies of Europe.

[Footnote 87: Chalcondyles (l. v.) and Ducas (c. 23) exhibit the rude
lineament of the Ottoman policy, and the transmutation of Christian
children into Turkish soldiers.]

[Footnote 88: This sketch of the Turkish education and discipline is
chiefly borrowed from Ricaut's State of the Ottoman Empire, the Stato
Militaire del' Imperio Ottomano of Count Marsigli, (in Haya, 1732, in
folio,) and a description of the Seraglio, approved by Mr. Greaves
himself, a curious traveller, and inserted in the second volume of his
works.]

[Footnote 89: From the series of cxv. viziers, till the siege of Vienna,
(Marsigli, p. 13,) their place may be valued at three years and a half
purchase.]

[Footnote 90: See the entertaining and judicious letters of Busbequius.]

The only hope of salvation for the Greek empire, and the adjacent
kingdoms, would have been some more powerful weapon, some discovery in
the art of war, that would give them a decisive superiority over their
Turkish foes. Such a weapon was in their hands; such a discovery had
been made in the critical moment of their fate. The chemists of China or
Europe had found, by casual or elaborate experiments, that a mixture of
saltpetre, sulphur, and charcoal, produces, with a spark of fire, a
tremendous explosion. It was soon observed, that if the expansive force
were compressed in a strong tube, a ball of stone or iron might be
expelled with irresistible and destructive velocity. The precise æra of
the invention and application of gunpowder ^91 is involved in doubtful
traditions and equivocal language; yet we may clearly discern, that it
was known before the middle of the fourteenth century; and that before
the end of the same, the use of artillery in battles and sieges, by sea
and land, was familiar to the states of Germany, Italy, Spain, France,
and England. ^92 The priority of nations is of small account; none could
derive any exclusive benefit from their previous or superior knowledge;
and in the common improvement, they stood on the same level of relative
power and military science. Nor was it possible to circumscribe the
secret within the pale of the church; it was disclosed to the Turks by
the treachery of apostates and the selfish policy of rivals; and the
sultans had sense to adopt, and wealth to reward, the talents of a
Christian engineer. The Genoese, who transported Amurath into Europe,
must be accused as his preceptors; and it was probably by their hands
that his cannon was cast and directed at the siege of Constantinople.
^93 The first attempt was indeed unsuccessful; but in the general
warfare of the age, the advantage was on theirside, who were most
commonly the assailants: for a while the proportion of the attack and
defence was suspended; and this thundering artillery was pointed against
the walls and towers which had been erected only to resist the less
potent engines of antiquity. By the Venetians, the use of gunpowder was
communicated without reproach to the sultans of Egypt and Persia, their
allies against the Ottoman power; the secret was soon propagated to the
extremities of Asia; and the advantage of the European was confined to
his easy victories over the savages of the new world. If we contrast the
rapid progress of this mischievous discovery with the slow and laborious
advances of reason, science, and the arts of peace, a philosopher,
according to his temper, will laugh or weep at the folly of mankind.

[Footnote 91: The first and second volumes of Dr. Watson's Chemical
Essays contain two valuable discourses on the discovery and composition
of gunpowder.]

[Footnote 92: On this subject modern testimonies cannot be trusted. The
original passages are collected by Ducange, (Gloss. Latin. tom. i. p.
675, Bombarda.) But in the early doubtful twilight, the name, sound,
fire, and effect, that seem to express ourartillery, may be fairly
interpreted of the old engines and the Greek fire. For the English
cannon at Crecy, the authority of John Villani (Chron. l. xii. c. 65)
must be weighed against the silence of Froissard. Yet Muratori
(Antiquit. ItaliæMedii Ævi, tom. ii. Dissert. xxvi. p. 514, 515) has
produced a decisive passage from Petrarch, (De Remediis utriusque
FortunæDialog.,) who, before the year 1344, execrates this terrestrial
thunder, nuperrara, nunccommunis. *

Note: * Mr. Hallam makes the following observation on the objection
thrown our by Gibbon: "The positive testimony of Villani, who died
within two years afterwards, and had manifestly obtained much
information as to the great events passing in France, cannot be
rejected. He ascribes a material effect to the cannon of Edward, Colpi
delle bombarde, which I suspect, from his strong expressions, had not
been employed before, except against stone walls. It seems, he says, as
if God thundered con grande uccisione di genti e efondamento di
cavalli." Middle Ages, vol. i. p. 510. -- M.]

[Footnote 93: The Turkish cannon, which Ducas (c. 30) first introduces
before Belgrade, (A.D. 1436,) is mentioned by Chalcondyles (l. v. p.
123) in 1422, at the siege of Constantinople.]

Chapter LXVI: Union Of The Greek And Latin Churches.Part I.

Applications Of The Eastern Emperors To The Popes. -- Visits To The
West, Of John The First, Manuel, And John The Second, Palæologus. --
Union Of The Greek And Latin Churches, Promoted By The Council Of Basil,
And Concluded At Ferrara And Florence. -- State Of Literature At
Constantinople. -- Its Revival In Italy By The Greek Fugitives. --
Curiosity And Emulation Of The Latins.

In the four last centuries of the Greek emperors, their friendly or
hostile aspect towards the pope and the Latins may be observed as the
thermometer of their prosperity or distress; as the scale of the rise
and fall of the Barbarian dynasties. When the Turks of the house of
Seljuk pervaded Asia, and threatened Constantinople, we have seen, at
the council of Placentia, the suppliant ambassadors of Alexius imploring
the protection of the common father of the Christians. No sooner had the
arms of the French pilgrims removed the sultan from Nice to Iconium,
than the Greek princes resumed, or avowed, their genuine hatred and
contempt for the schismatics of the West, which precipitated the first
downfall of their empire. The date of the Mogul invasion is marked in
the soft and charitable language of John Vataces. After the recovery of
Constantinople, the throne of the first Palæologus was encompassed by
foreign and domestic enemies; as long as the sword of Charles was
suspended over his head, he basely courted the favor of the Roman
pontiff; and sacrificed to the present danger his faith, his virtue, and
the affection of his subjects. On the decease of Michael, the prince and
people asserted the independence of their church, and the purity of
their creed: the elder Andronicus neither feared nor loved the Latins;
in his last distress, pride was the safeguard of superstition; nor could
he decently retract in his age the firm and orthodox declarations of his
youth. His grandson, the younger Andronicus, was less a slave in his
temper and situation; and the conquest of Bithynia by the Turks
admonished him to seek a temporal and spiritual alliance with the
Western princes. After a separation and silence of fifty years, a secret
agent, the monk Barlaam, was despatched to Pope Benedict the Twelfth;
and his artful instructions appear to have been drawn by the master-hand
of the great domestic. ^1 "Most holy father," was he commissioned to
say, "the emperor is not less desirous than yourself of a union between
the two churches: but in this delicate transaction, he is obliged to
respect his own dignity and the prejudices of his subjects. The ways of
union are twofold; force and persuasion. Of force, the inefficacy has
been already tried; since the Latins have subdued the empire, without
subduing the minds, of the Greeks. The method of persuasion, though
slow, is sure and permanent. A deputation of thirty or forty of our
doctors would probably agree with those of the Vatican, in the love of
truth and the unity of belief; but on their return, what would be the
use, the recompense, of such an agreement? the scorn of their brethren,
and the reproaches of a blind and obstinate nation. Yet that nation is
accustomed to reverence the general councils, which have fixed the
articles of our faith; and if they reprobate the decrees of Lyons, it is
because the Eastern churches were neither heard nor represented in that
arbitrary meeting. For this salutary end, it will be expedient, and even
necessary, that a well-chosen legate should be sent into Greece, to
convene the patriarchs of Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and
Jerusalem; and, with their aid, to prepare a free and universal synod.
But at this moment," continued the subtle agent, "the empire is
assaulted and endangered by the Turks, who have occupied four of the
greatest cities of Anatolia. The Christian inhabitants have expressed a
wish of returning to their allegiance and religion; but the forces and
revenues of the emperor are insufficient for their deliverance: and the
Roman legate must be accompanied, or preceded, by an army of Franks, to
expel the infidels, and open a way to the holy sepulchre." If the
suspicious Latins should require some pledge, some previous effect of
the sincerity of the Greeks, the answers of Barlaam were perspicuous and
rational. "1.A general synod can alone consummate the union of the
churches; nor can such a synod be held till the three Oriental
patriarchs, and a great number of bishops, are enfranchised from the
Mahometan yoke. 2.The Greeks are alienated by a long series of
oppression and injury: they must be reconciled by some act of brotherly
love, some effectual succor, which may fortify the authority and
arguments of the emperor, and the friends of the union. 3.If some
difference of faith or ceremonies should be found incurable, the Greeks,
however, are the disciples of Christ; and the Turks are the common
enemies of the Christian name. The Armenians, Cyprians, and Rhodians,
are equally attacked; and it will become the piety of the French princes
to draw their swords in the general defence of religion. 4.Should the
subjects of Andronicus be treated as the worst of schismatics, of
heretics, of pagans, a judicious policy may yet instruct the powers of
the West to embrace a useful ally, to uphold a sinking empire, to guard
the confines of Europe; and rather to join the Greeks against the Turks,
than to expect the union of the Turkish arms with the troops and
treasures of captive Greece." The reasons, the offers, and the demands,
of Andronicus were eluded with cold and stately indifference. The kings
of France and Naples declined the dangers and glory of a crusade; the
pope refused to call a new synod to determine old articles of faith; and
his regard for the obsolete claims of the Latin emperor and clergy
engaged him to use an offensive superscription, -- "To the moderator^2
of the Greeks, and the persons who style themselves the patriarchs of
the Eastern churches." For such an embassy, a time and character less
propitious could not easily have been found. Benedict the Twelfth ^3 was
a dull peasant, perplexed with scruples, and immersed in sloth and wine:
his pride might enrich with a third crown the papal tiara, but he was
alike unfit for the regal and the pastoral office.

[Footnote 1: This curious instruction was transcribed (I believe) from
the Vatican archives, by Odoricus Raynaldus, in his Continuation of the
Annals of Baronius, (Romæ, 1646--1677, in x. volumes in folio.) I have
contented myself with the AbbéFleury, (Hist. Ecclésiastique. tom. xx. p.
1--8,) whose abstracts I have always found to be clear, accurate, and
impartial.]

[Footnote 2: The ambiguity of this title is happy or ingenious; and
moderator, as synonymous to rector, gubernator, is a word of classical,
and even Ciceronian, Latinity, which may be found, not in the Glossary
of Ducange, but in the Thesaurus of Robert Stephens.]

[Footnote 3: The first epistle (sine titulo) of Petrarch exposes the
danger of the bark, and the incapacity of the pilot. Hæc inter, vino
madidus, ævo gravis, ac soporifero rore perfusus, jamjam nutitat,
dormitat, jam somno præceps, atque (utinam solus) ruit . . . . . Heu
quanto felicius patrio terram sulcasset aratro, quam scalmum piscatorium
ascendisset! This satire engages his biographer to weigh the virtues and
vices of Benedict XII. which have been exaggerated by Guelphs and Ghibe
lines, by Papists and Protestants, (see Mémoires sur la Vie de
Pétrarque, tom. i. p. 259, ii. not. xv. p. 13--16.) He gave occasion to
the saying, Bibamus papaliter.]

After the decease of Andronicus, while the Greeks were distracted by
intestine war, they could not presume to agitate a general union of the
Christians. But as soon as Cantacuzene had subdued and pardoned his
enemies, he was anxious to justify, or at least to extenuate, the
introduction of the Turks into Europe, and the nuptials of his daughter
with a Mussulman prince. Two officers of state, with a Latin
interpreter, were sent in his name to the Roman court, which was
transplanted to Avignon, on the banks of the Rhône, during a period of
seventy years: they represented the hard necessity which had urged him
to embrace the alliance of the miscreants, and pronounced by his command
the specious and edifying sounds of union and crusade. Pope Clement the
Sixth, ^4 the successor of Benedict, received them with hospitality and
honor, acknowledged the innocence of their sovereign, excused his
distress, applauded his magnanimity, and displayed a clear knowledge of
the state and revolutions of the Greek empire, which he had imbibed from
the honest accounts of a Savoyard lady, an attendant of the empress
Anne. ^5 If Clement was ill endowed with the virtues of a priest, he
possessed, however, the spirit and magnificence of a prince, whose
liberal hand distributed benefices and kingdoms with equal facility.
Under his reign Avignon was the seat of pomp and pleasure: in his youth
he had surpassed the licentiousness of a baron; and the palace, nay, the
bed-chamber of the pope, was adorned, or polluted, by the visits of his
female favorites. The wars of France and England were adverse to the
holy enterprise; but his vanity was amused by the splendid idea; and the
Greek ambassadors returned with two Latin bishops, the ministers of the
pontiff. On their arrival at Constantinople, the emperor and the nuncios
admired each other's piety and eloquence; and their frequent conferences
were filled with mutual praises and promises, by which both parties were
amused, and neither could be deceived. "I am delighted," said the devout
Cantacuzene, "with the project of our holy war, which must redound to my
personal glory, as well as to the public benefit of Christendom. My
dominions will give a free passage to the armies of France: my troops,
my galleys, my treasures, shall be consecrated to the common cause; and
happy would be my fate, could I deserve and obtain the crown of
martyrdom. Words are insufficient to express the ardor with which I sigh
for the reunion of the scattered members of Christ. If my death could
avail, I would gladly present my sword and my neck: if the spiritual
phnix could arise from my ashes, I would erect the pile, and kindle the
flame with my own hands." Yet the Greek emperor presumed to observe,
that the articles of faith which divided the two churches had been
introduced by the pride and precipitation of the Latins: he disclaimed
the servile and arbitrary steps of the first Palæologus; and firmly
declared, that he would never submit his conscience unless to the
decrees of a free and universal synod. "The situation of the times,"
continued he, "will not allow the pope and myself to meet either at Rome
or Constantinople; but some maritime city may be chosen on the verge of
the two empires, to unite the bishops, and to instruct the faithful, of
the East and West." The nuncios seemed content with the proposition; and
Cantacuzene affects to deplore the failure of his hopes, which were soon
overthrown by the death of Clement, and the different temper of his
successor. His own life was prolonged, but it was prolonged in a
cloister; and, except by his prayers, the humble monk was incapable of
directing the counsels of his pupil or the state. ^6

[Footnote 4: See the original Lives of Clement VI. in Muratori, (Script.
Rerum Italicarum, tom. iii. P. ii. p. 550--589;) Matteo Villani, (Chron.
l. iii. c. 43, in Muratori, tom. xiv. p. 186,) who styles him, molto
cavallaresco, poco religioso; Fleury, (Hist. Ecclés. tom. xx. p. 126;)
and the Vie de Pétrarque, (tom. ii. p. 42--45.) The abbéde Sade treats
him with the most indulgence; but heis a gentleman as well as a priest.]

[Footnote 5: Her name (most probably corrupted) was Zampea. She had
accompanied, and alone remained with her mistress at Constantinople,
where her prudence, erudition, and politeness deserved the praises of
the Greeks themselves, (Cantacuzen. l. i. c. 42.)]

[Footnote 6: See this whole negotiation in Cantacuzene, (l. iv. c. 9,)
who, amidst the praises and virtues which he bestows on himself, reveals
the uneasiness of a guilty conscience.]

Yet of all the Byzantine princes, that pupil, John Palæologus, was the
best disposed to embrace, to believe, and to obey, the shepherd of the
West. His mother, Anne of Savoy, was baptized in the bosom of the Latin
church: her marriage with Andronicus imposed a change of name, of
apparel, and of worship, but her heart was still faithful to her country
and religion: she had formed the infancy of her son, and she governed
the emperor, after his mind, or at least his stature, was enlarged to
the size of man. In the first year of his deliverance and restoration,
the Turks were still masters of the Hellespont; the son of Cantacuzene
was in arms at Adrianople; and Palæologus could depend neither on
himself nor on his people. By his mother's advice, and in the hope of
foreign aid, he abjured the rights both of the church and state; and the
act of slavery, ^7 subscribed in purple ink, and sealed with the
goldenbull, was privately intrusted to an Italian agent. The first
article of the treaty is an oath of fidelity and obedience to Innocent
the Sixth and his successors, the supreme pontiffs of the Roman and
Catholic church. The emperor promises to entertain with due reverence
their legates and nuncios; to assign a palace for their residence, and a
temple for their worship; and to deliver his second son Manuel as the
hostage of his faith. For these condescensions he requires a prompt
succor of fifteen galleys, with five hundred men at arms, and a thousand
archers, to serve against his Christian and Mussulman enemies.
Palæologus engages to impose on his clergy and people the same spiritual
yoke; but as the resistance of the Greeks might be justly foreseen, he
adopts the two effectual methods of corruption and education. The legate
was empowered to distribute the vacant benefices among the ecclesiastics
who should subscribe the creed of the Vatican: three schools were
instituted to instruct the youth of Constantinople in the language and
doctrine of the Latins; and the name of Andronicus, the heir of the
empire, was enrolled as the first student. Should he fail in the
measures of persuasion or force, Palæologus declares himself unworthy to
reign; transferred to the pope all regal and paternal authority; and
invests Innocent with full power to regulate the family, the government,
and the marriage, of his son and successor. But this treaty was neither
executed nor published: the Roman galleys were as vain and imaginary as
the submission of the Greeks; and it was only by the secrecy that their
sovereign escaped the dishonor of this fruitless humiliation.

[Footnote 7: See this ignominious treaty in Fleury, (Hist. Ecclés. p.
151--154,) from Raynaldus, who drew it from the Vatican archives. It was
not worth the trouble of a pious forgery.]

The tempest of the Turkish arms soon burst on his head; and after the
loss of Adrianople and Romania, he was enclosed in his capital, the
vassal of the haughty Amurath, with the miserable hope of being the last
devoured by the savage. In this abject state, Palæologus embraced the
resolution of embarking for Venice, and casting himself at the feet of
the pope: he was the first of the Byzantine princes who had ever visited
the unknown regions of the West, yet in them alone he could seek
consolation or relief; and with less violation of his dignity he might
appear in the sacred college than at the Ottoman Porte. After a long
absence, the Roman pontiffs were returning from Avignon to the banks of
the Tyber: Urban the Fifth, ^8 of a mild and virtuous character,
encouraged or allowed the pilgrimage of the Greek prince; and, within
the same year, enjoyed the glory of receiving in the Vatican the two
Imperial shadows who represented the majesty of Constantine and
Charlemagne. In this suppliant visit, the emperor of Constantinople,
whose vanity was lost in his distress, gave more than could be expected
of empty sounds and formal submissions. A previous trial was imposed;
and, in the presence of four cardinals, he acknowledged, as a true
Catholic, the supremacy of the pope, and the double procession of the
Holy Ghost. After this purification, he was introduced to a public
audience in the church of St. Peter: Urban, in the midst of the
cardinals, was seated on his throne; the Greek monarch, after three
genuflections, devoutly kissed the feet, the hands, and at length the
mouth, of the holy father, who celebrated high mass in his presence,
allowed him to lead the bridle of his mule, and treated him with a
sumptuous banquet in the Vatican. The entertainment of Palæologus was
friendly and honorable; yet some difference was observed between the
emperors of the East and West; ^9 nor could the former be entitled to
the rare privilege of chanting the gospel in the rank of a deacon. ^10
In favor of his proselyte, Urban strove to rekindle the zeal of the
French king and the other powers of the West; but he found them cold in
the general cause, and active only in their domestic quarrels. The last
hope of the emperor was in an English mercenary, John Hawkwood, ^11 or
Acuto, who, with a band of adventurers, the white brotherhood, had
ravaged Italy from the Alps to Calabria; sold his services to the
hostile states; and incurred a just excommunication by shooting his
arrows against the papal residence. A special license was granted to
negotiate with the outlaw, but the forces, or the spirit, of Hawkwood,
were unequal to the enterprise: and it was for the advantage, perhaps,
of Palæologus to be disappointed of succor, that must have been costly,
that could not be effectual, and which might have been dangerous. ^12
The disconsolate Greek ^13 prepared for his return, but even his return
was impeded by a most ignominious obstacle. On his arrival at Venice, he
had borrowed large sums at exorbitant usury; but his coffers were empty,
his creditors were impatient, and his person was detained as the best
security for the payment. His eldest son, Andronicus, the regent of
Constantinople, was repeatedly urged to exhaust every resource; and even
by stripping the churches, to extricate his father from captivity and
disgrace. But the unnatural youth was insensible of the disgrace, and
secretly pleased with the captivity of the emperor: the state was poor,
the clergy were obstinate; nor could some religious scruple be wanting
to excuse the guilt of his indifference and delay. Such undutiful
neglect was severely reproved by the piety of his brother Manuel, who
instantly sold or mortgaged all that he possessed, embarked for Venice,
relieved his father, and pledged his own freedom to be responsible for
the debt. On his return to Constantinople, the parent and king
distinguished his two sons with suitable rewards; but the faith and
manners of the slothful Palæologus had not been improved by his Roman
pilgrimage; and his apostasy or conversion, devoid of any spiritual or
temporal effects, was speedily forgotten by the Greeks and Latins. ^14

[Footnote 8: See the two first original Lives of Urban V., (in Muratori,
Script. Rerum Italicarum, tom. iii. P. ii. p. 623, 635,) and the
Ecclesiastical Annals of Spondanus, (tom. i. p. 573, A.D. 1369, No. 7,)
and Raynaldus, (Fleury, Hist. Ecclés. tom. xx. p. 223, 224.) Yet, from
some variations, I suspect the papal writers of slightly magnifying the
genuflections of Palæologus.]

[Footnote 9: Paullo minus quam si fuisset Imperator Romanorum. Yet his
title of Imperator Græcorum was no longer disputed, (Vit. Urban V. p.
623.)]

[Footnote 10: It was confined to the successors of Charlemagne, and to
them only on Christmas-day. On all other festivals these Imperial
deacons were content to serve the pope, as he said mass, with the book
and the corporale. Yet the abbéde Sade generously thinks that the merits
of Charles IV. might have entitled him, though not on the proper day,
(A.D. 1368, November 1,) to the whole privilege. He seems to affix a
just value on the privilege and the man, (Vie de Petrarque, tom. iii. p.
735.)]

[Footnote 11: Through some Italian corruptions, the etymology of Falcone
in bosco, (Matteo Villani, l. xi. c. 79, in Muratori, tom. xv. p. 746,)
suggests the English word Hawkwood, the true name of our adventurous
countryman, (Thomas Walsingham, Hist. Anglican. inter Scriptores
Camdeni, p. 184.) After two-and-twenty victories, and one defeat, he
died, in 1394, general of the Florentines, and was buried with such
honors as the republic has not paid to Dante or Petrarch, (Muratori,
Annali d'Italia, tom. xii. p. 212--371.)]

[Footnote 12: This torrent of English (by birth or service) overflowed
from France into Italy after the peace of Bretigny in 1630. Yet the
exclamation of Muratori (Annali, tom. xii. p. 197) is rather true than
civil. "Ci mancava ancor questo, che dopo essere calpestrata l'Italia da
tanti masnadieri Tedeschi ed Ungheri, venissero fin dall' Inghliterra
nuovi cania finire di divorarla."]

[Footnote 13: Chalcondyles, l. i. p. 25, 26. The Greek supposes his
journey to the king of France, which is sufficiently refuted by the
silence of the national historians. Nor am I much more inclined to
believe, that Palæologus departed from Italy, valde bene consolatus et
contentus, (Vit. Urban V. p. 623.)]

[Footnote 14: His return in 1370, and the coronation of Manuel, Sept.
25, 1373, (Ducange, Fam. Byzant. p. 241,) leaves some intermediate æra
for the conspiracy and punishment of Andronicus.]

Thirty years after the return of Palæologus, his son and successor,
Manuel, from a similar motive, but on a larger scale, again visited the
countries of the West. In a preceding chapter I have related his treaty
with Bajazet, the violation of that treaty, the siege or blockade of
Constantinople, and the French succor under the command of the gallant
Boucicault. ^15 By his ambassadors, Manuel had solicited the Latin
powers; but it was thought that the presence of a distressed monarch
would draw tears and supplies from the hardest Barbarians; ^16 and the
marshal who advised the journey prepared the reception of the Byzantine
prince. The land was occupied by the Turks; but the navigation of Venice
was safe and open: Italy received him as the first, or, at least, as the
second, of the Christian princes; Manuel was pitied as the champion and
confessor of the faith; and the dignity of his behavior prevented that
pity from sinking into contempt. From Venice he proceeded to Padua and
Pavia; and even the duke of Milan, a secret ally of Bajazet, gave him
safe and honorable conduct to the verge of his dominions. ^17 On the
confines of France ^18 the royal officers undertook the care of his
person, journey, and expenses; and two thousand of the richest citizens,
in arms and on horseback, came forth to meet him as far as Charenton, in
the neighborhood of the capital. At the gates of Paris, he was saluted
by the chancellor and the parliament; and Charles the Sixth, attended by
his princes and nobles, welcomed his brother with a cordial embrace. The
successor of Constantine was clothed in a robe of white silk, and
mounted on a milk-white steed, a circumstance, in the French ceremonial,
of singular importance: the white color is considered as the symbol of
sovereignty; and, in a late visit, the German emperor, after a haughty
demand and a peevish refusal, had been reduced to content himself with a
black courser. Manuel was lodged in the Louvre; a succession of feasts
and balls, the pleasures of the banquet and the chase, were ingeniously
varied by the politeness of the French, to display their magnificence,
and amuse his grief: he was indulged in the liberty of his chapel; and
the doctors of the Sorbonne were astonished, and possibly scandalized,
by the language, the rites, and the vestments, of his Greek clergy. But
the slightest glance on the state of the kingdom must teach him to
despair of any effectual assistance. The unfortunate Charles, though he
enjoyed some lucid intervals, continually relapsed into furious or
stupid insanity: the reins of government were alternately seized by his
brother and uncle, the dukes of Orleans and Burgundy, whose factious
competition prepared the miseries of civil war. The former was a gay
youth, dissolved in luxury and love: the latter was the father of John
count of Nevers, who had so lately been ransomed from Turkish captivity;
and, if the fearless son was ardent to revenge his defeat, the more
prudent Burgundy was content with the cost and peril of the first
experiment. When Manuel had satiated the curiosity, and perhaps fatigued
the patience, of the French, he resolved on a visit to the adjacent
island. In his progress from Dover, he was entertained at Canterbury
with due reverence by the prior and monks of St. Austin; and, on
Blackheath, King Henry the Fourth, with the English court, saluted the
Greek hero, (I copy our old historian,) who, during many days, was
lodged and treated in London as emperor of the East. ^19 But the state
of England was still more adverse to the design of the holy war. In the
same year, the hereditary sovereign had been deposed and murdered: the
reigning prince was a successful usurper, whose ambition was punished by
jealousy and remorse: nor could Henry of Lancaster withdraw his person
or forces from the defence of a throne incessantly shaken by conspiracy
and rebellion. He pitied, he praised, he feasted, the emperor of
Constantinople; but if the English monarch assumed the cross, it was
only to appease his people, and perhaps his conscience, by the merit or
semblance of his pious intention. ^20 Satisfied, however, with gifts and
honors, Manuel returned to Paris; and, after a residence of two years in
the West, shaped his course through Germany and Italy, embarked at
Venice, and patiently expected, in the Morea, the moment of his ruin or
deliverance. Yet he had escaped the ignominious necessity of offering
his religion to public or private sale. The Latin church was distracted
by the great schism; the kings, the nations, the universities, of Europe
were divided in their obedience between the popes of Rome and Avignon;
and the emperor, anxious to conciliate the friendship of both parties,
abstained from any correspondence with the indigent and unpopular
rivals. His journey coincided with the year of the jubilee; but he
passed through Italy without desiring, or deserving, the plenary
indulgence which abolished the guilt or penance of the sins of the
faithful. The Roman pope was offended by this neglect; accused him of
irreverence to an image of Christ; and exhorted the princes of Italy to
reject and abandon the obstinate schismatic. ^21

[Footnote 15: Mémoires de Boucicault, P. i. c. 35, 36.]

[Footnote 16: His journey into the west of Europe is slightly, and I
believe reluctantly, noticed by Chalcondyles (l. ii. c. 44--50) and
Ducas, (c. 14.)]

[Footnote 17: Muratori, Annali d'Italia, tom. xii. p. 406. John Galeazzo
was the first and most powerful duke of Milan. His connection with
Bajazet is attested by Froissard; and he contributed to save and deliver
the French captives of Nicopolis.]

[Footnote 18: For the reception of Manuel at Paris, see Spondanus,
(Annal. Ecclés. tom. i. p. 676, 677, A.D. 1400, No. 5,) who quotes
Juvenal des Ursins and the monk of St. Denys; and Villaret, (Hist. de
France, tom. xii. p. 331--334,) who quotes nobody according to the last
fashion of the French writers.]

[Footnote 19: A short note of Manuel in England is extracted by Dr. Hody
from a MS. at Lambeth, (de Græcis illustribus, p. 14,) C. P. Imperator,
diu variisque et horrendis Paganorum insultibus coarctatus, ut pro
eisdem resistentiam triumphalem perquireret, Anglorum Regem visitare
decrevit, &c. Rex (says Walsingham, p. 364) nobili apparatû. . .
suscepit (ut decuit) tantum Heroa, duxitque Londonias, et per multos
dies exhibuit gloriose, pro expensis hospitii sui solvens, et eum
respiciens tanto fastigio donativis. He repeats the same in his Upodigma
Neustriæ, (p. 556.)]

[Footnote 20: Shakspeare begins and ends the play of Henry IV. with that
prince's vow of a crusade, and his belief that he should die in
Jerusalem.]

[Footnote 21: This fact is preserved in the Historia Politica, A.D.
1391--1478, published by Martin Crusius, (Turco Græcia, p. 1--43.) The
image of Christ, which the Greek emperor refused to worship, was
probably a work of sculpture.]

Chapter LXVI: Union Of The Greek And Latin Churches. -- Part II.

During the period of the crusades, the Greeks beheld with astonishment
and terror the perpetual stream of emigration that flowed, and continued
to flow, from the unknown climates of their West. The visits of their
last emperors removed the veil of separation, and they disclosed to
their eyes the powerful nations of Europe, whom they no longer presumed
to brand with the name of Barbarians. The observations of Manuel, and
his more inquisitive followers, have been preserved by a Byzantine
historian of the times: ^22 his scattered ideas I shall collect and
abridge; and it may be amusing enough, perhaps instructive, to
contemplate the rude pictures of Germany, France, and England, whose
ancient and modern state are so familiar to ourminds. I. Germany (says
the Greek Chalcondyles) is of ample latitude from Vienna to the ocean;
and it stretches (a strange geography) from Prague in Bohemia to the
River Tartessus, and the Pyrenæan Mountains. ^23 The soil, except in
figs and olives, is sufficiently fruitful; the air is salubrious; the
bodies of the natives are robust and healthy; and these cold regions are
seldom visited with the calamities of pestilence, or earthquakes. After
the Scythians or Tartars, the Germans are the most numerous of nations:
they are brave and patient; and were they united under a single head,
their force would be irresistible. By the gift of the pope, they have
acquired the privilege of choosing the Roman emperor; ^24 nor is any
people more devoutly attached to the faith and obedience of the Latin
patriarch. The greatest part of the country is divided among the princes
and prelates; but Strasburg, Cologne, Hamburgh, and more than two
hundred free cities, are governed by sage and equal laws, according to
the will, and for the advantage, of the whole community. The use of
duels, or single combats on foot, prevails among them in peace and war:
their industry excels in all the mechanic arts; and the Germans may
boast of the invention of gunpowder and cannon, which is now diffused
over the greatest part of the world. II. The kingdom of France is spread
above fifteen or twenty days' journey from Germany to Spain, and from
the Alps to the British Ocean; containing many flourishing cities, and
among these Paris, the seat of the king, which surpasses the rest in
riches and luxury. Many princes and lords alternately wait in his
palace, and acknowledge him as their sovereign: the most powerful are
the dukes of Bretagne and Burgundy; of whom the latter possesses the
wealthy province of Flanders, whose harbors are frequented by the ships
and merchants of our own, and the more remote, seas. The French are an
ancient and opulent people; and their language and manners, though
somewhat different, are not dissimilar from those of the Italians. Vain
of the Imperial dignity of Charlemagne, of their victories over the
Saracens, and of the exploits of their heroes, Oliver and Rowland, ^25
they esteem themselves the first of the western nations; but this
foolish arrogance has been recently humbled by the unfortunate events of
their wars against the English, the inhabitants of the British island.
III. Britain, in the ocean, and opposite to the shores of Flanders, may
be considered either as one, or as three islands; but the whole is
united by a common interest, by the same manners, and by a similar
government. The measure of its circumference is five thousand stadia:
the land is overspread with towns and villages: though destitute of
wine, and not abounding in fruit-trees, it is fertile in wheat and
barley; in honey and wool; and much cloth is manufactured by the
inhabitants. In populousness and power, in richness and luxury, London,
^26 the metropolis of the isle, may claim a preeminence over all the
cities of the West. It is situate on the Thames, a broad and rapid
river, which at the distance of thirty miles falls into the Gallic Sea;
and the daily flow and ebb of the tide affords a safe entrance and
departure to the vessels of commerce. The king is head of a powerful and
turbulent aristocracy: his principal vassals hold their estates by a
free and unalterable tenure; and the laws define the limits of his
authority and their obedience. The kingdom has been often afflicted by
foreign conquest and domestic sedition: but the natives are bold and
hardy, renowned in arms and victorious in war. The form of their shields
or targets is derived from the Italians, that of their swords from the
Greeks; the use of the long bow is the peculiar and decisive advantage
of the English. Their language bears no affinity to the idioms of the
Continent: in the habits of domestic life, they are not easily
distinguished from their neighbors of France: but the most singular
circumstance of their manners is their disregard of conjugal honor and
of female chastity. In their mutual visits, as the first act of
hospitality, the guest is welcomed in the embraces of their wives and
daughters: among friends they are lent and borrowed without shame; nor
are the islanders offended at this strange commerce, and its inevitable
consequences. ^27 Informed as we are of the customs of Old England and
assured of the virtue of our mothers, we may smile at the credulity, or
resent the injustice, of the Greek, who must have confounded a modest
salute ^28 with a criminal embrace. But his credulity and injustice may
teach an important lesson; to distrust the accounts of foreign and
remote nations, and to suspend our belief of every tale that deviates
from the laws of nature and the character of man. ^29

[Footnote 22: The Greek and Turkish history of Laonicus Chalcondyles
ends with the winter of 1463; and the abrupt conclusion seems to mark,
that he laid down his pen in the same year. We know that he was an
Athenian, and that some contemporaries of the same name contributed to
the revival of the Greek language in Italy. But in his numerous
digressions, the modest historian has never introduced himself; and his
editor Leunclavius, as well as Fabricius, (Bibliot. Græc. tom. vi. p.
474,) seems ignorant of his life and character. For his descriptions of
Germany, France, and England, see l. ii. p. 36, 37, 44--50.]

[Footnote 23: I shall not animadvert on the geographical errors of
Chalcondyles. In this instance, he perhaps followed, and mistook,
Herodotus, (l. ii. c. 33,) whose text may be explained, (Herodote de
Larcher, tom. ii. p. 219, 220,) or whose ignorance may be excused. Had
these modern Greeks never read Strabo, or any of their lesser
geographers?]

[Footnote 24: A citizen of new Rome, while new Rome survived, would have
scorned to dignify the German 'Rhx with titles of BasileuV or Autokratwr
'Rwmaiwn: but all pride was extinct in the bosom of Chalcondyles; and he
describes the Byzantine prince, and his subject, by the proper, though
humble, names of ''EllhneV and BasileuV 'Ellhnwn.]

[Footnote 25: Most of the old romances were translated in the xivth
century into French prose, and soon became the favorite amusement of the
knights and ladies in the court of Charles VI. If a Greek believed in
the exploits of Rowland and Oliver, he may surely be excused, since the
monks of St. Denys, the national historians, have inserted the fables of
Archbishop Turpin in their Chronicles of France.]

[Footnote 26: Londinh . . . . de te poliV dunamei te proecousa tvn en th
nhsw tauth pasvn polewn, olbw te kai th allh eudaimonia oudemiaV tvn
peoV esperan leipomenh. Even since the time of Fitzstephen, (the xiith
century,) London appears to have maintained this preeminence of wealth
and magnitude; and her gradual increase has, at least, kept pace with
the general improvement of Europe.]

[Footnote 27: If the double sense of the verb Kuw (osculor, and in utero
gero) be equivocal, the context and pious horror of Chalcondyles can
leave no doubt of his meaning and mistake, (p. 49.) *

Note: * I can discover no "pious horror" in the plain manner in which
Chalcondyles relates this strange usage. He says, oude aiscunun tovto
feoei eautoiV kuesqai taV te gunaikaV autvn kai taV qugateraV, yet these
are expression beyond what would be used, if the ambiguous word kuesqai
were taken in its more innocent sense. Nor can the phrase parecontai taV
eautvn gunaikaV en toiV epithdeioiV well bear a less coarse
interpretation. Gibbon is possibly right as to the origin of this
extraordinary mistake. -- M.]

[Footnote 28: Erasmus (Epist. Fausto Andrelino) has a pretty passage on
the English fashion of kissing strangers on their arrival and departure,
from whence, however, he draws no scandalous inferences.]

[Footnote 29: Perhaps we may apply this remark to the community of wives
among the old Britons, as it is supposed by Cæsar and Dion, (Dion
Cassius, l. lxii. tom. ii. p. 1007,) with Reimar's judicious annotation.
The Arreoyof Otaheite, so certain at first, is become less visible and
scandalous, in proportion as we have studied the manners of that gentle
and amorous people.]

After his return, and the victory of Timour, Manuel reigned many years
in prosperity and peace. As long as the sons of Bajazet solicited his
friendship and spared his dominions, he was satisfied with the national
religion; and his leisure was employed in composing twenty theological
dialogues for its defence. The appearance of the Byzantine ambassadors
at the council of Constance, ^30 announces the restoration of the
Turkish power, as well as of the Latin church: the conquest of the
sultans, Mahomet and Amurath, reconciled the emperor to the Vatican; and
the siege of Constantinople almost tempted him to acquiesce in the
double procession of the Holy Ghost. When Martin the Fifth ascended
without a rival the chair of St. Peter, a friendly intercourse of
letters and embassies was revived between the East and West. Ambition on
one side, and distress on the other, dictated the same decent language
of charity and peace: the artful Greek expressed a desire of marrying
his six sons to Italian princesses; and the Roman, not less artful,
despatched the daughter of the marquis of Montferrat, with a company of
noble virgins, to soften, by their charms, the obstinacy of the
schismatics. Yet under this mask of zeal, a discerning eye will perceive
that all was hollow and insincere in the court and church of
Constantinople. According to the vicissitudes of danger and repose, the
emperor advanced or retreated; alternately instructed and disavowed his
ministers; and escaped from the importunate pressure by urging the duty
of inquiry, the obligation of collecting the sense of his patriarchs and
bishops, and the impossibility of convening them at a time when the
Turkish arms were at the gates of his capital. From a review of the
public transactions it will appear that the Greeks insisted on three
successive measures, a succor, a council, and a final reunion, while the
Latins eluded the second, and only promised the first, as a
consequential and voluntary reward of the third. But we have an
opportunity of unfolding the most secret intentions of Manuel, as he
explained them in a private conversation without artifice or disguise.
In his declining age, the emperor had associated John Palæologus, the
second of the name, and the eldest of his sons, on whom he devolved the
greatest part of the authority and weight of government. One day, in the
presence only of the historian Phranza, ^31 his favorite chamberlain, he
opened to his colleague and successor the true principle of his
negotiations with the pope. ^32 "Our last resource," said Manuel,
against the Turks, "is their fear of our union with the Latins, of the
warlike nations of the West, who may arm for our relief and for their
destruction. As often as you are threatened by the miscreants, present
this danger before their eyes. Propose a council; consult on the means;
but ever delay and avoid the convocation of an assembly, which cannot
tend either to our spiritual or temporal emolument. The Latins are
proud; the Greeks are obstinate; neither party will recede or retract;
and the attempt of a perfect union will confirm the schism, alienate the
churches, and leave us, without hope or defence, at the mercy of the
Barbarians." Impatient of this salutary lesson, the royal youth arose
from his seat, and departed in silence; and the wise monarch (continued
Phranza) casting his eyes on me, thus resumed his discourse: "My son
deems himself a great and heroic prince; but, alas! our miserable age
does not afford scope for heroism or greatness. His daring spirit might
have suited the happier times of our ancestors; but the present state
requires not an emperor, but a cautious steward of the last relics of
our fortunes. Well do I remember the lofty expectations which he built
on our alliance with Mustapha; and much do I fear, that this rash
courage will urge the ruin of our house, and that even religion may
precipitate our downfall." Yet the experience and authority of Manuel
preserved the peace, and eluded the council; till, in the seventy-eighth
year of his age, and in the habit of a monk, he terminated his career,
dividing his precious movables among his children and the poor, his
physicians and his favorite servants. Of his six sons, ^33 Andronicus
the Second was invested with the principality of Thessalonica, and died
of a leprosy soon after the sale of that city to the Venetians and its
final conquest by the Turks. Some fortunate incidents had restored
Peloponnesus, or the Morea, to the empire; and in his more prosperous
days, Manuel had fortified the narrow isthmus of six miles ^34 with a
stone wall and one hundred and fifty-three towers. The wall was
overthrown by the first blast of the Ottomans; the fertile peninsula
might have been sufficient for the four younger brothers, Theodore and
Constantine, Demetrius and Thomas; but they wasted in domestic contests
the remains of their strength; and the least successful of the rivals
were reduced to a life of dependence in the Byzantine palace.

[Footnote 30: See Lenfant, Hist. du Concile de Constance, tom. ii. p.
576; and or the ecclesiastical history of the times, the Annals of
Spondanus the Bibliothèque of Dupin, tom. xii., and xxist and xxiid
volumes of the History, or rather the Continuation, of Fleury.]

[Footnote 31: From his early youth, George Phranza, or Phranzes, was
employed in the service of the state and palace; and Hanckius (de
Script. Byzant. P. i. c. 40) has collected his life from his own
writings. He was no more than four-and-twenty years of age at the death
of Manuel, who recommended him in the strongest terms to his successor:
Imprimis vero hunc Phranzen tibi commendo, qui ministravit mihi
fideliter et diligenter (Phranzes, l. ii. c. i.) Yet the emperor John
was cold, and he preferred the service of the despots of Peloponnesus.]

[Footnote 32: See Phranzes, l. ii. c. 13. While so many manuscripts of
the Greek original are extant in the libraries of Rome, Milan, the
Escurial, &c., it is a matter of shame and reproach, that we should be
reduced to the Latin version, or abstract, of James Pontanus, (ad calcem
Theophylact, Simocattæ: Ingolstadt, 1604,) so deficient in accuracy and
elegance, (Fabric. Bibliot. Græc. tom. vi. p. 615--620.) *

Note: * The Greek text of Phranzes was edited by F. C. Alter Vindobonæ,
1796. It has been re-edited by Bekker for the new edition of the
Byzantines, Bonn, 1838. -- M.]

[Footnote 33: See Ducange, Fam. Byzant. p. 243--248.]

[Footnote 34: The exact measure of the Hexamilion, from sea to sea, was
3800 orgyiæ, or toises, of six Greek feet, (Phranzes, l. i. c. 38,)
which would produce a Greek mile, still smaller than that of 660 French
toises, which is assigned by D'Anville, as still in use in Turkey. Five
miles are commonly reckoned for the breadth of the isthmus. See the
Travels of Spon, Wheeler and Chandler.]

The eldest of the sons of Manuel, John Palæologus the Second, was
acknowledged, after his father's death, as the sole emperor of the
Greeks. He immediately proceeded to repudiate his wife, and to contract
a new marriage with the princess of Trebizond: beauty was in his eyes
the first qualification of an empress; and the clergy had yielded to his
firm assurance, that unless he might be indulged in a divorce, he would
retire to a cloister, and leave the throne to his brother Constantine.
The first, and in truth the only, victory of Palæologus, was over a Jew,
^35 whom, after a long and learned dispute, he converted to the
Christian faith; and this momentous conquest is carefully recorded in
the history of the times. But he soon resumed the design of uniting the
East and West; and, regardless of his father's advice, listened, as it
should seem with sincerity, to the proposal of meeting the pope in a
general council beyond the Adriatic. This dangerous project was
encouraged by Martin the Fifth, and coldly entertained by his successor
Eugenius, till, after a tedious negotiation, the emperor received a
summons from the Latin assembly of a new character, the independent
prelates of Basil, who styled themselves the representatives and judges
of the Catholic church.

[Footnote 35: The first objection of the Jews is on the death of Christ:
if it were voluntary, Christ was a suicide; which the emperor parries
with a mystery. They then dispute on the conception of the Virgin, the
sense of the prophecies, &c., (Phranzes, l. ii. c. 12, a whole
chapter.)]

The Roman pontiff had fought and conquered in the cause of
ecclesiastical freedom; but the victorious clergy were soon exposed to
the tyranny of their deliverer; and his sacred character was
invulnerable to those arms which they found so keen and effectual
against the civil magistrate. Their great charter, the right of
election, was annihilated by appeals, evaded by trusts or commendams,
disappointed by reversionary grants, and superseded by previous and
arbitrary reservations. ^36 A public auction was instituted in the court
of Rome: the cardinals and favorites were enriched with the spoils of
nations; and every country might complain that the most important and
valuable benefices were accumulated on the heads of aliens and
absentees. During their residence at Avignon, the ambition of the popes
subsided in the meaner passions of avarice ^37 and luxury: they
rigorously imposed on the clergy the tributes of first-fruits and
tenths; but they freely tolerated the impunity of vice, disorder, and
corruption. These manifold scandals were aggravated by the great schism
of the West, which continued above fifty years. In the furious conflicts
of Rome and Avignon, the vices of the rivals were mutually exposed; and
their precarious situation degraded their authority, relaxed their
discipline, and multiplied their wants and exactions. To heal the
wounds, and restore the monarchy, of the church, the synods of Pisa and
Constance ^38 were successively convened; but these great assemblies,
conscious of their strength, resolved to vindicate the privileges of the
Christian aristocracy. From a personal sentence against two pontiffs,
whom they rejected, and a third, their acknowledged sovereign, whom they
deposed, the fathers of Constance proceeded to examine the nature and
limits of the Roman supremacy; nor did they separate till they had
established the authority, above the pope, of a general council. It was
enacted, that, for the government and reformation of the church, such
assemblies should be held at regular intervals; and that each synod,
before its dissolution, should appoint the time and place of the
subsequent meeting. By the influence of the court of Rome, the next
convocation at Sienna was easily eluded; but the bold and vigorous
proceedings of the council of Basil ^39 had almost been fatal to the
reigning pontiff, Eugenius the Fourth. A just suspicion of his design
prompted the fathers to hasten the promulgation of their first decree,
that the representatives of the church-militant on earth were invested
with a divine and spiritual jurisdiction over all Christians, without
excepting the pope; and that a general council could not be dissolved,
prorogued, or transferred, unless by their free deliberation and
consent. On the notice that Eugenius had fulminated a bull for that
purpose, they ventured to summon, to admonish, to threaten, to censure
the contumacious successor of St. Peter. After many delays, to allow
time for repentance, they finally declared, that, unless he submitted
within the term of sixty days, he was suspended from the exercise of all
temporal and ecclesiastical authority. And to mark their jurisdiction
over the prince as well as the priest, they assumed the government of
Avignon, annulled the alienation of the sacred patrimony, and protected
Rome from the imposition of new taxes. Their boldness was justified, not
only by the general opinion of the clergy, but by the support and power
of the first monarchs of Christendom: the emperor Sigismond declared
himself the servant and protector of the synod; Germany and France
adhered to their cause; the duke of Milan was the enemy of Eugenius; and
he was driven from the Vatican by an insurrection of the Roman people.
Rejected at the same time by temporal and spiritual subjects, submission
was his only choice: by a most humiliating bull, the pope repealed his
own acts, and ratified those of the council; incorporated his legates
and cardinals with that venerable body; and seemedto resign himself to
the decrees of the supreme legislature. Their fame pervaded the
countries of the East: and it was in their presence that Sigismond
received the ambassadors of the Turkish sultan, ^40 who laid at his feet
twelve large vases, filled with robes of silk and pieces of gold. The
fathers of Basil aspired to the glory of reducing the Greeks, as well as
the Bohemians, within the pale of the church; and their deputies invited
the emperor and patriarch of Constantinople to unite with an assembly
which possessed the confidence of the Western nations. Palæologus was
not averse to the proposal; and his ambassadors were introduced with due
honors into the Catholic senate. But the choice of the place appeared to
be an insuperable obstacle, since he refused to pass the Alps, or the
sea of Sicily, and positively required that the synod should be
adjourned to some convenient city in Italy, or at least on the Danube.
The other articles of this treaty were more readily stipulated: it was
agreed to defray the travelling expenses of the emperor, with a train of
seven hundred persons, ^41 to remit an immediate sum of eight thousand
ducats ^42 for the accommodation of the Greek clergy; and in his absence
to grant a supply of ten thousand ducats, with three hundred archers and
some galleys, for the protection of Constantinople. The city of Avignon
advanced the funds for the preliminary expenses; and the embarkation was
prepared at Marseilles with some difficulty and delay.

[Footnote 36: In the treatise delle Materie Beneficiarie of Fra Paolo,
(in the ivth volume of the last, and best, edition of his works,) the
papal system is deeply studied and freely described. Should Rome and her
religion be annihilated, this golden volume may still survive, a
philosophical history, and a salutary warning.]

[Footnote 37: Pope John XXII. (in 1334) left behind him, at Avignon,
eighteen millions of gold florins, and the value of seven millions more
in plate and jewels. See the Chronicle of John Villani, (l. xi. c. 20,
in Muratori's Collection, tom. xiii. p. 765,) whose brother received the
account from the papal treasurers. A treasure of six or eight millions
sterling in the xivth century is enormous, and almost incredible.]

[Footnote 38: A learned and liberal Protestant, M. Lenfant, has given a
fair history of the councils of Pisa, Constance, and Basil, in six
volumes in quarto; but the last part is the most hasty and imperfect,
except in the account of the troubles of Bohemia.]

[Footnote 39: The original acts or minutes of the council of Basil are
preserved in the public library, in twelve volumes in folio. Basil was a
free city, conveniently situate on the Rhine, and guarded by the arms of
the neighboring and confederate Swiss. In 1459, the university was
founded by Pope Pius II., (Æneas Sylvius,) who had been secretary to the
council. But what is a council, or a university, to the presses o Froben
and the studies of Erasmus?]

[Footnote 40: This Turkish embassy, attested only by Crantzius, is
related with some doubt by the annalist Spondanus, A.D. 1433, No. 25,
tom. i. p. 824.]

[Footnote 41: Syropulus, p. 19. In this list, the Greeks appear to have
exceeded the real numbers of the clergy and laity which afterwards
attended the emperor and patriarch, but which are not clearly specified
by the great ecclesiarch. The 75,000 florins which they asked in this
negotiation of the pope, (p. 9,) were more than they could hope or
want.]

[Footnote 42: I use indifferently the words ducatand florin, which
derive their names, the former from the dukesof Milan, the latter from
the republic of Florence. These gold pieces, the first that were coined
in Italy, perhaps in the Latin world, may be compared in weight and
value to one third of the English guinea.]

In his distress, the friendship of Palæologus was disputed by the
ecclesiastical powers of the West; but the dexterous activity of a
monarch prevailed over the slow debates and inflexible temper of a
republic. The decrees of Basil continually tended to circumscribe the
despotism of the pope, and to erect a supreme and perpetual tribunal in
the church. Eugenius was impatient of the yoke; and the union of the
Greeks might afford a decent pretence for translating a rebellious synod
from the Rhine to the Po. The independence of the fathers was lost if
they passed the Alps: Savoy or Avignon, to which they acceded with
reluctance, were described at Constantinople as situate far beyond the
pillars of Hercules; ^43 the emperor and his clergy were apprehensive of
the dangers of a long navigation; they were offended by a haughty
declaration, that after suppressing the newheresy of the Bohemians, the
council would soon eradicate the oldheresy of the Greeks. ^44 On the
side of Eugenius, all was smooth, and yielding, and respectful; and he
invited the Byzantine monarch to heal by his presence the schism of the
Latin, as well as of the Eastern, church. Ferrara, near the coast of the
Adriatic, was proposed for their amicable interview; and with some
indulgence of forgery and theft, a surreptitious decree was procured,
which transferred the synod, with its own consent, to that Italian city.
Nine galleys were equipped for the service at Venice, and in the Isle of
Candia; their diligence anticipated the slower vessels of Basil: the
Roman admiral was commissioned to burn, sink, and destroy; ^45 and these
priestly squadrons might have encountered each other in the same seas
where Athens and Sparta had formerly contended for the preeminence of
glory. Assaulted by the importunity of the factions, who were ready to
fight for the possession of his person, Palæologus hesitated before he
left his palace and country on a perilous experiment. His father's
advice still dwelt on his memory; and reason must suggest, that since
the Latins were divided among themselves, they could never unite in a
foreign cause. Sigismond dissuaded the unreasonable adventure; his
advice was impartial, since he adhered to the council; and it was
enforced by the strange belief, that the German Cæsar would nominate a
Greek his heir and successor in the empire of the West. ^46 Even the
Turkish sultan was a counsellor whom it might be unsafe to trust, but
whom it was dangerous to offend. Amurath was unskilled in the disputes,
but he was apprehensive of the union, of the Christians. From his own
treasures, he offered to relieve the wants of the Byzantine court; yet
he declared with seeming magnanimity, that Constantinople should be
secure and inviolate, in the absence of her sovereign. ^47 The
resolution of Palæologus was decided by the most splendid gifts and the
most specious promises: he wished to escape for a while from a scene of
danger and distress and after dismissing with an ambiguous answer the
messengers of the council, he declared his intention of embarking in the
Roman galleys. The age of the patriarch Joseph was more susceptible of
fear than of hope; he trembled at the perils of the sea, and expressed
his apprehension, that his feeble voice, with thirty perhaps of his
orthodox brethren, would be oppressed in a foreign land by the power and
numbers of a Latin synod. He yielded to the royal mandate, to the
flattering assurance, that he would be heard as the oracle of nations,
and to the secret wish of learning from his brother of the West, to
deliver the church from the yoke of kings. ^48 The five cross-bearers,
or dignitaries, of St. Sophia, were bound to attend his person; and one
of these, the great ecclesiarch or preacher, Sylvester Syropulus, ^49
has composed a free and curious history ^50 of the falseunion. ^51 Of
the clergy that reluctantly obeyed the summons of the emperor and the
patriarch, submission was the first duty, and patience the most useful
virtue. In a chosen list of twenty bishops, we discover the metropolitan
titles of Heracleæand Cyzicus, Nice and Nicomedia, Ephesus and
Trebizond, and the personal merit of Mark and Bessarion who, in the
confidence of their learning and eloquence, were promoted to the
episcopal rank. Some monks and philosophers were named to display the
science and sanctity of the Greek church; and the service of the choir
was performed by a select band of singers and musicians. The patriarchs
of Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem, appeared by their genuine or
fictitious deputies; the primate of Russia represented a national
church, and the Greeks might contend with the Latins in the extent of
their spiritual empire. The precious vases of St. Sophia were exposed to
the winds and waves, that the patriarch might officiate with becoming
splendor: whatever gold the emperor could procure, was expended in the
massy ornaments of his bed and chariot; ^52 and while they affected to
maintain the prosperity of their ancient fortune, they quarrelled for
the division of fifteen thousand ducats, the first alms of the Roman
pontiff. After the necessary preparations, John Palæologus, with a
numerous train, accompanied by his brother Demetrius, and the most
respectable persons of the church and state, embarked in eight vessels
with sails and oars which steered through the Turkish Straits of
Gallipoli to the Archipelago, the Morea, and the Adriatic Gulf. ^53

[Footnote 43: At the end of the Latin version of Phranzes, we read a
long Greek epistle or declamation of George of Trebizond, who advises
the emperor to prefer Eugenius and Italy. He treats with contempt the
schismatic assembly of Basil, the Barbarians of Gaul and Germany, who
had conspired to transport the chair of St. Peter beyond the Alps; oi
aqlioi (says he) se kai thn meta sou sunodon exw tvn 'Hrakleiwn sthlwn
kai pera Gadhrwn exaxousi. Was Constantinople unprovided with a map?]

[Footnote 44: Syropulus (p. 26--31) attests his own indignation, and
that of his countrymen; and the Basil deputies, who excused the rash
declaration, could neither deny nor alter an act of the council.]

[Footnote 45: Condolmieri, the pope's nephew and admiral, expressly
declared, oti orismon eceipara tou Papa ina polemhsh opou an eurh ta
katerga thV Sunodou, kai ei dunhqh, katadush, kai ajanish. The naval
orders of the synod were less peremptory, and, till the hostile
squadrons appeared, both parties tried to conceal their quarrel from the
Greeks.]

[Footnote 46: Syropulus mentions the hopes of Palæologus, (p. 36,) and
the last advice of Sigismond,(p. 57.) At Corfu, the Greek emperor was
informed of his friend's death; had he known it sooner, he would have
returned home,(p. 79.)]

[Footnote 47: Phranzes himself, though from different motives, was of
the advice of Amurath, (l. ii. c. 13.) Utinam ne synodus ista unquam
fuisset, si tantes offensiones et detrimenta paritura erat. This Turkish
embassy is likewise mentioned by Syropulus, (p. 58;) and Amurath kept
his word. He might threaten, (p. 125, 219,) but he never attacked, the
city.]

[Footnote 48: The reader will smile at the simplicity with which he
imparted these hopes to his favorites: toiauthn plhrojorian schsein
hlpize kai dia tou Papa eqarrei eleuqervdai thn ekklhsian apo thV
apoteqeishV autou douleiaV para tou basilewV, (p. 92.) Yet it would have
been difficult for him to have practised the lessons of Gregory VII.]

[Footnote 49: The Christian name of Sylvester is borrowed from the Latin
calendar. In modern Greek, pouloV, as a diminutive, is added to the end
of words: nor can any reasoning of Creyghton, the editor, excuse his
changing into Sguropulus, (Sguros, fuscus,) the Syropulus of his own
manuscript, whose name is subscribed with his own hand in the acts of
the council of Florence. Why might not the author be of Syrian
extraction?]

[Footnote 50: From the conclusion of the history, I should fix the date
to the year 1444, four years after the synod, when great ecclesiarch had
abdicated his office, (section xii. p. 330--350.) His passions were
cooled by time and retirement; and, although Syropulus is often partial,
he is never intemperate.]

[Footnote 51: Vera historia unionis non ver inter Græcos et Latinos,
(Haga Comitis, 1660, in folio,) was first published with a loose and
florid version, by Robert Creyghton, chaplain to Charles II. in his
exile. The zeal of the editor has prefixed a polemic title, for the
beginning of the original is wanting. Syropulus may be ranked with the
best of the Byzantine writers for the merit of his narration, and even
of his style; but he is excluded from the orthodox collections of the
councils.]

[Footnote 52: Syropulus (p. 63) simply expresses his intention in' outw
pompawn en' 'ItaloiV megaV basileuV par ekeinvn nomizoito; and the Latin
of Creyghton may afford a specimen of his florid paraphrase. Ut
pompâcircumductus noster Imperator Italiæpopulis aliquis deauratus
Jupiter crederetur, aut Crsus ex opulenta Lydia.]

[Footnote 53: Although I cannot stop to quote Syropulus for every fact,
I will observe that the navigation of the Greeks from Constantinople to
Venice and Ferrara is contained in the ivth section, (p. 67--100,) and
that the historian has the uncommon talent of placing each scene before
the reader's eye.]

Chapter LXVI: Union Of The Greek And Latin Churches. -- Part III.

After a tedious and troublesome navigation of seventy-seven days, this
religious squadron cast anchor before Venice; and their reception
proclaimed the joy and magnificence of that powerful republic. In the
command of the world, the modest Augustus had never claimed such honors
from his subjects as were paid to his feeble successor by an independent
state. Seated on the poop on a lofty throne, he received the visit, or,
in the Greek style, the adorationof the doge and senators. ^54 They
sailed in the Bucentaur, which was accompanied by twelve stately
galleys: the sea was overspread with innumerable gondolas of pomp and
pleasure; the air resounded with music and acclamations; the mariners,
and even the vessels, were dressed in silk and gold; and in all the
emblems and pageants, the Roman eagles were blended with the lions of
St. Mark. The triumphal procession, ascending the great canal, passed
under the bridge of the Rialto; and the Eastern strangers gazed with
admiration on the palaces, the churches, and the populousness of a city,
that seems to float on the bosom of the waves. ^55 They sighed to behold
the spoils and trophies with which it had been decorated after the sack
of Constantinople. After a hospitable entertainment of fifteen days,
Palæologus pursued his journey by land and water from Venice to Ferrara;
and on this occasion the pride of the Vatican was tempered by policy to
indulge the ancient dignity of the emperor of the East. He made his
entry on a blackhorse; but a milk-white steed, whose trappings were
embroidered with golden eagles, was led before him; and the canopy was
borne over his head by the princes of Este, the sons or kinsmen of
Nicholas, marquis of the city, and a sovereign more powerful than
himself. ^56 Palæologus did not alight till he reached the bottom of the
staircase: the pope advanced to the door of the apartment; refused his
proffered genuflection; and, after a paternal embrace, conducted the
emperor to a seat on his left hand. Nor would the patriarch descend from
his galley, till a ceremony almost equal, had been stipulated between
the bishops of Rome and Constantinople. The latter was saluted by his
brother with a kiss of union and charity; nor would any of the Greek
ecclesiastics submit to kiss the feet of the Western primate. On the
opening of the synod, the place of honor in the centre was claimed by
the temporal and ecclesiastical chiefs; and it was only by alleging that
his predecessors had not assisted in person at Nice or Chalcedon, that
Eugenius could evade the ancient precedents of Constantine and Marcian.
After much debate, it was agreed that the right and left sides of the
church should be occupied by the two nations; that the solitary chair of
St. Peter should be raised the first of the Latin line; and that the
throne of the Greek emperor, at the head of his clergy, should be equal
and opposite to the second place, the vacant seat of the emperor of the
West. ^57

[Footnote 54: At the time of the synod, Phranzes was in Peloponnesus:
but he received from the despot Demetrius a faithful account of the
honorable reception of the emperor and patriarch both at Venice and
Ferrara, (Dux . . . . sedentem Imperatorem adorat,) which are more
slightly mentioned by the Latins, (l. ii. c. 14, 15, 16.)]

[Footnote 55: The astonishment of a Greek prince and a French ambassador
(Mémoires de Philippe de Comines, l. vii. c. 18,) at the sight of
Venice, abundantly proves that in the xvth century it was the first and
most splendid of the Christian cities. For the spoils of Constantinople
at Venice, see Syropulus, (p. 87.)]

[Footnote 56: Nicholas III. of Este reigned forty-eight years, (A.D.
1393--1441,) and was lord of Ferrara, Modena, Reggio, Parma, Rovigo, and
Commachio. See his Life in Muratori, (AntichitàEstense, tom. ii. p.
159--201.)]

[Footnote 57: The Latin vulgar was provoked to laughter at the strange
dresses of the Greeks, and especially the length of their garments,
their sleeves, and their beards; nor was the emperor distinguished,
except by the purple color, and his diadem or tiara, with a jewel on the
top, (Hody de Græcis Illustribus, p. 31.) Yet another spectator
confesses that the Greek fashion was piu grave e piu degna than the
Italian. (Vespasiano in Vit. Eugen. IV. in Muratori, tom. xxv. p. 261.)]

But as soon as festivity and form had given place to a more serious
treaty, the Greeks were dissatisfied with their journey, with
themselves, and with the pope. The artful pencil of his emissaries had
painted him in a prosperous state; at the head of the princes and
prelates of Europe, obedient at his voice, to believe and to arm. The
thin appearance of the universal synod of Ferrara betrayed his weakness:
and the Latins opened the first session with only five archbishops,
eighteen bishops, and ten abbots, the greatest part of whom were the
subjects or countrymen of the Italian pontiff. Except the duke of
Burgundy, none of the potentates of the West condescended to appear in
person, or by their ambassadors; nor was it possible to suppress the
judicial acts of Basil against the dignity and person of Eugenius, which
were finally concluded by a new election. Under these circumstances, a
truce or delay was asked and granted, till Palæologus could expect from
the consent of the Latins some temporal reward for an unpopular union;
and after the first session, the public proceedings were adjourned above
six months. The emperor, with a chosen band of his favorites and
Janizaries, fixed his summer residence at a pleasant, spacious
monastery, six miles from Ferrara; forgot, in the pleasures of the
chase, the distress of the church and state; and persisted in destroying
the game, without listening to the just complaints of the marquis or the
husbandman. ^58 In the mean while, his unfortunate Greeks were exposed
to all the miseries of exile and poverty; for the support of each
stranger, a monthly allowance was assigned of three or four gold
florins; and although the entire sum did not amount to seven hundred
florins, a long arrear was repeatedly incurred by the indigence or
policy of the Roman court. ^59 They sighed for a speedy deliverance, but
their escape was prevented by a triple chain: a passport from their
superiors was required at the gates of Ferrara; the government of Venice
had engaged to arrest and send back the fugitives; and inevitable
punishment awaited them at Constantinople; excommunication, fines, and a
sentence, which did not respect the sacerdotal dignity, that they should
be stripped naked and publicly whipped. ^60 It was only by the
alternative of hunger or dispute that the Greeks could be persuaded to
open the first conference; and they yielded with extreme reluctance to
attend from Ferrara to Florence the rear of a flying synod. This new
translation was urged by inevitable necessity: the city was visited by
the plague; the fidelity of the marquis might be suspected; the
mercenary troops of the duke of Milan were at the gates; and as they
occupied Romagna, it was not without difficulty and danger that the
pope, the emperor, and the bishops, explored their way through the
unfrequented paths of the Apennine. ^61

[Footnote 58: For the emperor's hunting, see Syropulus, (p. 143, 144,
191.) The pope had sent him eleven miserable hacks; but he bought a
strong and swift horse that came from Russia. The name of Janizariesmay
surprise; but the name, rather than the institution, had passed from the
Ottoman, to the Byzantine, court, and is often used in the last age of
the empire.]

[Footnote 59: The Greeks obtained, with much difficulty, that instead of
provisions, money should be distributed, four florins permonth to the
persons of honorable rank, and three florins to their servants, with an
addition of thirty more to the emperor, twenty-five to the patriarch,
and twenty to the prince, or despot, Demetrius. The payment of the first
month amounted to 691 florins, a sum which will not allow us to reckon
above 200 Greeks of every condition. (Syropulus, p. 104, 105.) On the
20th October, 1438, there was an arrear of four months; in April, 1439,
of three; and of five and a half in July, at the time of the union, (p.
172, 225, 271.)]

[Footnote 60: Syropulus (p. 141, 142, 204, 221) deplores the
imprisonment of the Greeks, and the tyranny of the emperor and
patriarch.]

[Footnote 61: The wars of Italy are most clearly represented in the
xiiith vol. of the Annals of Muratori. The schismatic Greek, Syropulus,
(p. 145,) appears to have exaggerated the fear and disorder of the pope
in his retreat from Ferrara to Florence, which is proved by the acts to
have been somewhat more decent and deliberate.]

Yet all these obstacles were surmounted by time and policy. The violence
of the fathers of Basil rather promoted than injured the cause of
Eugenius; the nations of Europe abhorred the schism, and disowned the
election, of Felix the Fifth, who was successively a duke of Savoy, a
hermit, and a pope; and the great princes were gradually reclaimed by
his competitor to a favorable neutrality and a firm attachment. The
legates, with some respectable members, deserted to the Roman army,
which insensibly rose in numbers and reputation; the council of Basil
was reduced to thirty-nine bishops, and three hundred of the inferior
clergy; ^62 while the Latins of Florence could produce the subscriptions
of the pope himself, eight cardinals, two patriarchs, eight archbishops,
fifty two bishops, and forty-five abbots, or chiefs of religious orders.
After the labor of nine months, and the debates of twenty-five sessions,
they attained the advantage and glory of the reunion of the Greeks. Four
principal questions had been agitated between the two churches; 1.The
use of unleavened bread in the communion of Christ's body. 2.The nature
of purgatory. 3.The supremacy of the pope. And, 4.The single or double
procession of the Holy Ghost. The cause of either nation was managed by
ten theological champions: the Latins were supported by the
inexhaustible eloquence of Cardinal Julian; and Mark of Ephesus and
Bessarion of Nice were the bold and able leaders of the Greek forces. We
may bestow some praise on the progress of human reason, by observing
that the first of these questions was now treated as an immaterial rite,
which might innocently vary with the fashion of the age and country.
With regard to the second, both parties were agreed in the belief of an
intermediate state of purgation for the venial sins of the faithful; and
whether their souls were purified by elemental fire was a doubtful
point, which in a few years might be conveniently settled on the spot by
the disputants. The claims of supremacy appeared of a more weighty and
substantial kind; yet by the Orientals the Roman bishop had ever been
respected as the first of the five patriarchs; nor did they scruple to
admit, that his jurisdiction should be exercised agreeably to the holy
canons; a vague allowance, which might be defined or eluded by
occasional convenience. The procession of the Holy Ghost from the Father
alone, or from the Father and the Son, was an article of faith which had
sunk much deeper into the minds of men; and in the sessions of Ferrara
and Florence, the Latin addition of filioquewas subdivided into two
questions, whether it were legal, and whether it were orthodox. Perhaps
it may not be necessary to boast on this subject of my own impartial
indifference; but I must think that the Greeks were strongly supported
by the prohibition of the council of Chalcedon, against adding any
article whatsoever to the creed of Nice, or rather of Constantinople.
^63 In earthly affairs, it is not easy to conceive how an assembly equal
of legislators can bind their successors invested with powers equal to
their own. But the dictates of inspiration must be true and
unchangeable; nor should a private bishop, or a provincial synod, have
presumed to innovate against the judgment of the Catholic church. On the
substance of the doctrine, the controversy was equal and endless: reason
is confounded by the procession of a deity: the gospel, which lay on the
altar, was silent; the various texts of the fathers might be corrupted
by fraud or entangled by sophistry; and the Greeks were ignorant of the
characters and writings of the Latin saints. ^64 Of this at least we may
be sure, that neither side could be convinced by the arguments of their
opponents. Prejudice may be enlightened by reason, and a superficial
glance may be rectified by a clear and more perfect view of an object
adapted to our faculties. But the bishops and monks had been taught from
their infancy to repeat a form of mysterious words: their national and
personal honor depended on the repetition of the same sounds; and their
narrow minds were hardened and inflamed by the acrimony of a public
dispute.

[Footnote 62: Syropulus is pleased to reckon seven hundred prelates in
the council of Basil. The error is manifest, and perhaps voluntary. That
extravagant number could not be supplied by allthe ecclesiastics of
every degree who were present at the council, nor by allthe absent
bishops of the West, who, expressly or tacitly, might adhere to its
decrees.]

[Footnote 63: The Greeks, who disliked the union, were unwilling to
sally from this strong fortress, (p. 178, 193, 195, 202, of Syropulus.)
The shame of the Latins was aggravated by their producing an old MS. of
the second council of Nice, with filioquein the Nicene creed. A palpable
forgery! (p. 173.)]

[Footnote 64: 'WV egw (said an eminent Greek) otan eiV naon eiselqw
Datinwn ou proskunv tina tvn ekeise agiwn, epei oude gnwrizw tina,
(Syropulus, p. 109.) See the perplexity of the Greeks, (p. 217, 218,
252, 253, 273.)]

While they were most in a cloud of dust and darkness, the Pope and
emperor were desirous of a seeming union, which could alone accomplish
the purposes of their interview; and the obstinacy of public dispute was
softened by the arts of private and personal negotiation. The patriarch
Joseph had sunk under the weight of age and infirmities; his dying voice
breathed the counsels of charity and concord, and his vacant benefice
might tempt the hopes of the ambitious clergy. The ready and active
obedience of the archbishops of Russia and Nice, of Isidore and
Bessarion, was prompted and recompensed by their speedy promotion to the
dignity of cardinals. Bessarion, in the first debates, had stood forth
the most strenuous and eloquent champion of the Greek church; and if the
apostate, the bastard, was reprobated by his country, ^65 he appears in
ecclesiastical story a rare example of a patriot who was recommended to
court favor by loud opposition and well-timed compliance. With the aid
of his two spiritual coadjutors, the emperor applied his arguments to
the general situation and personal characters of the bishops, and each
was successively moved by authority and example. Their revenues were in
the hands of the Turks, their persons in those of the Latins: an
episcopal treasure, three robes and forty ducats, was soon exhausted:
^66 the hopes of their return still depended on the ships of Venice and
the alms of Rome; and such was their indigence, that their arrears, the
payment of a debt, would be accepted as a favor, and might operate as a
bribe. ^67 The danger and relief of Constantinople might excuse some
prudent and pious dissimulation; and it was insinuated, that the
obstinate heretics who should resist the consent of the East and West
would be abandoned in a hostile land to the revenge or justice of the
Roman pontiff. ^68 In the first private assembly of the Greeks, the
formulary of union was approved by twenty-four, and rejected by twelve,
members; but the five cross-bearersof St. Sophia, who aspired to
represent the patriarch, were disqualified by ancient discipline; and
their right of voting was transferred to the obsequious train of monks,
grammarians, and profane laymen. The will of the monarch produced a
false and servile unanimity, and no more than two patriots had courage
to speak their own sentiments and those of their country. Demetrius, the
emperor's brother, retired to Venice, that he might not be witness of
the union; and Mark of Ephesus, mistaking perhaps his pride for his
conscience, disclaimed all communion with the Latin heretics, and avowed
himself the champion and confessor of the orthodox creed. ^69 In the
treaty between the two nations, several forms of consent were proposed,
such as might satisfy the Latins, without dishonoring the Greeks; and
they weighed the scruples of words and syllables, till the theological
balance trembled with a slight preponderance in favor of the Vatican. It
was agreed (I must entreat the attention of the reader) that the Holy
Ghost proceeds from the Father andthe Son, as from one principle and one
substance; that he proceeds bythe Son, being of the same nature and
substance, and that he proceeds from the Father andthe Son, by one
spirationand production. It is less difficult to understand the articles
of the preliminary treaty; that the pope should defray all the expenses
of the Greeks in their return home; that he should annually maintain two
galleys and three hundred soldiers for the defence of Constantinople:
that all the ships which transported pilgrims to Jerusalem should be
obliged to touch at that port; that as often as they were required, the
pope should furnish ten galleys for a year, or twenty for six months;
and that he should powerfully solicit the princes of Europe, if the
emperor had occasion for land forces.

[Footnote 65: See the polite altercation of Marc and Bessarion in
Syropulus, (p. 257,) who never dissembles the vices of his own party,
and fairly praises the virtues of the Latins.]

[Footnote 66: For the poverty of the Greek bishops, see a remarkable
passage of Ducas, (c. 31.) One had possessed, for his whole property,
three old gowns, &c. By teaching one-and-twenty years in his monastery,
Bessarion himself had collected forty gold florins; but of these, the
archbishop had expended twenty-eight in his voyage from Peloponnesus,
and the remainder at Constantinople, (Syropulus, p. 127.)]

[Footnote 67: Syropulus denies that the Greeks received any money before
they had subscribed the art of union, (p. 283:) yet he relates some
suspicious circumstances; and their bribery and corruption are
positively affirmed by the historian Ducas.]

[Footnote 68: The Greeks most piteously express their own fears of exile
and perpetual slavery, (Syropul. p. 196;) and they were strongly moved
by the emperor's threats, (p. 260.)]

[Footnote 69: I had forgot another popular and orthodox protester: a
favorite bound, who usually lay quiet on the foot-cloth of the emperor's
throne but who barked most furiously while the act of union was reading
without being silenced by the soothing or the lashes of the royal
attendants, (Syropul. p. 265, 266.)]

The same year, and almost the same day, were marked by the deposition of
Eugenius at Basil; and, at Florence, by his reunion of the Greeks and
Latins. In the former synod, (which he styled indeed an assembly of
dæmons,) the pope was branded with the guilt of simony, perjury,
tyranny, heresy, and schism; ^70 and declared to be incorrigible in his
vices, unworthy of any title, and incapable of holding any
ecclesiastical office. In the latter, he was revered as the true and
holy vicar of Christ, who, after a separation of six hundred years, had
reconciled the Catholics of the East and West in one fold, and under one
shepherd. The act of union was subscribed by the pope, the emperor, and
the principal members of both churches; even by those who, like
Syropulus, ^71 had been deprived of the right of voting. Two copies
might have sufficed for the East and West; but Eugenius was not
satisfied, unless four authentic and similar transcripts were signed and
attested as the monuments of his victory. ^72 On a memorable day, the
sixth of July, the successors of St. Peter and Constantine ascended
their thrones the two nations assembled in the cathedral of Florence;
their representatives, Cardinal Julian and Bessarion archbishop of Nice,
appeared in the pulpit, and, after reading in their respective tongues
the act of union, they mutually embraced, in the name and the presence
of their applauding brethren. The pope and his ministers then officiated
according to the Roman liturgy; the creed was chanted with the addition
of filioque; the acquiescence of the Greeks was poorly excused by their
ignorance of the harmonious, but inarticulate sounds; ^73 and the more
scrupulous Latins refused any public celebration of the Byzantine rite.
Yet the emperor and his clergy were not totally unmindful of national
honor. The treaty was ratified by their consent: it was tacitly agreed
that no innovation should be attempted in their creed or ceremonies:
they spared, and secretly respected, the generous firmness of Mark of
Ephesus; and, on the decease of the patriarch, they refused to elect his
successor, except in the cathedral of St. Sophia. In the distribution of
public and private rewards, the liberal pontiff exceeded their hopes and
his promises: the Greeks, with less pomp and pride, returned by the same
road of Ferrara and Venice; and their reception at Constantinople was
such as will be described in the following chapter. ^74 The success of
the first trial encouraged Eugenius to repeat the same edifying scenes;
and the deputies of the Armenians, the Maronites, the Jacobites of Syria
and Egypt, the Nestorians and the Æthiopians, were successively
introduced, to kiss the feet of the Roman pontiff, and to announce the
obedience and the orthodoxy of the East. These Oriental embassies,
unknown in the countries which they presumed to represent, ^75 diffused
over the West the fame of Eugenius; and a clamor was artfully propagated
against the remnant of a schism in Switzerland and Savoy, which alone
impeded the harmony of the Christian world. The vigor of opposition was
succeeded by the lassitude of despair: the council of Basil was silently
dissolved; and Felix, renouncing the tiara, again withdrew to the devout
or delicious hermitage of Ripaille. ^76 A general peace was secured by
mutual acts of oblivion and indemnity: all ideas of reformation
subsided; the popes continued to exercise and abuse their ecclesiastical
despotism; nor has Rome been since disturbed by the mischiefs of a
contested election. ^77

[Footnote 70: From the original Lives of the Popes, in Muratori's
Collection, (tom. iii. p. ii. tom. xxv.,) the manners of Eugenius IV.
appear to have been decent, and even exemplary. His situation, exposed
to the world and to his enemies, was a restraint, and is a pledge.]

[Footnote 71: Syropulus, rather than subscribe, would have assisted, as
the least evil, at the ceremony of the union. He was compelled to do
both; and the great ecclesiarch poorly excuses his submission to the
emperor, (p. 290--292.)]

[Footnote 72: None of these original acts of union can at present be
produced. Of the ten MSS. that are preserved, (five at Rome, and the
remainder at Florence, Bologna, Venice, Paris, and London,) nine have
been examined by an accurate critic, (M. de Brequigny,) who condemns
them for the variety and imperfections of the Greek signatures. Yet
several of these may be esteemed as authentic copies, which were
subscribed at Florence, before (26th of August, 1439) the final
separation of the pope and emperor, (Mémoires de l'Académie des
Inscriptions, tom. xliii. p. 287--311.)]

[Footnote 73: ''Hmin de wV ashmoi edokoun jwnai, (Syropul. p. 297.)]

[Footnote 74: In their return, the Greeks conversed at Bologna with the
ambassadors of England: and after some questions and answers, these
impartial strangers laughed at the pretended union of Florence,
(Syropul. p. 307.)]

[Footnote 75: So nugatory, or rather so fabulous, are these reunions of
the Nestorians, Jacobites, &c., that I have turned over, without
success, the Bibliotheca Orientalis of Assemannus, a faithful slave of
the Vatican.]

[Footnote 76: Ripaille is situate near Thonon in Savoy, on the southern
side of the Lake of Geneva. It is now a Carthusian abbey; and Mr.
Addison (Travels into Italy, vol. ii. p. 147, 148, of Baskerville's
edition of his works) has celebrated the place and the founder. Æneas
Sylvius, and the fathers of Basil, applaud the austere life of the ducal
hermit; but the French and Italian proverbs most unluckily attest the
popular opinion of his luxury.]

[Footnote 77: In this account of the councils of Basil, Ferrara, and
Florence, I have consulted the original acts, which fill the xviith and
xviiith tome of the edition of Venice, and are closed by the
perspicuous, though partial, history of Augustin Patricius, an Italian
of the xvth century. They are digested and abridged by Dupin,
(Bibliothèque Ecclés. tom. xii.,) and the continuator of Fleury, (tom.
xxii.;) and the respect of the Gallican church for the adverse parties
confines their members to an awkward moderation.]

The journeys of three emperors were unavailing for their temporal, or
perhaps their spiritual, salvation; but they were productive of a
beneficial consequence -- the revival of the Greek learning in Italy,
from whence it was propagated to the last nations of the West and North.
In their lowest servitude and depression, the subjects of the Byzantine
throne were still possessed of a golden key that could unlock the
treasures of antiquity; of a musical and prolific language, that gives a
soul to the objects of sense, and a body to the abstractions of
philosophy. Since the barriers of the monarchy, and even of the capital,
had been trampled under foot, the various Barbarians had doubtless
corrupted the form and substance of the national dialect; and ample
glossaries have been composed, to interpret a multitude of words, of
Arabic, Turkish, Sclavonian, Latin, or French origin. ^78 But a purer
idiom was spoken in the court and taught in the college; and the
flourishing state of the language is described, and perhaps embellished,
by a learned Italian, ^79 who, by a long residence and noble marriage,
^80 was naturalized at Constantinople about thirty years before the
Turkish conquest. "The vulgar speech," says Philelphus, ^81 "has been
depraved by the people, and infected by the multitude of strangers and
merchants, who every day flock to the city and mingle with the
inhabitants. It is from the disciples of such a school that the Latin
language received the versions of Aristotle and Plato; so obscure in
sense, and in spirit so poor. But the Greeks who have escaped the
contagion, are those whom wefollow; and they alone are worthy of our
imitation. In familiar discourse, they still speak the tongue of
Aristophanes and Euripides, of the historians and philosophers of
Athens; and the style of their writings is still more elaborate and
correct. The persons who, by their birth and offices, are attached to
the Byzantine court, are those who maintain, with the least alloy, the
ancient standard of elegance and purity; and the native graces of
language most conspicuously shine among the noble matrons, who are
excluded from all intercourse with foreigners. With foreigners do I say?
They live retired and sequestered from the eyes of their
fellow-citizens. Seldom are they seen in the streets; and when they
leave their houses, it is in the dusk of evening, on visits to the
churches and their nearest kindred. On these occasions, they are on
horseback, covered with a veil, and encompassed by their parents, their
husbands, or their servants." ^82

[Footnote 78: In the first attempt, Meursius collected 3600
Græco-barbarous words, to which, in a second edition, he subjoined 1800
more; yet what plenteous gleanings did he leave to Portius, Ducange,
Fabrotti, the Bollandists, &c.! (Fabric. Bibliot. Græc. tom. x. p. 101,
&c.) SomePersic words may be found in Xenophon, and some Latin ones in
Plutarch; and such is the inevitable effect of war and commerce; but the
form and substance of the language were not affected by this slight
alloy.]

[Footnote 79: The life of Francis Philelphus, a sophist, proud,
restless, and rapacious, has been diligently composed by Lancelot
(Mémoires de l'Académie des Inscriptions, tom. x. p. 691--751) (Istoria
della Letteratura Italiana, tom. vii. p. 282--294,) for the most part
from his own letters. His elaborate writings, and those of his
contemporaries, are forgotten; but their familiar epistles still
describe the men and the times.]

[Footnote 80: He married, and had perhaps debauched, the daughter of
John, and the granddaughter of Manuel Chrysoloras. She was young,
beautiful, and wealthy; and her noble family was allied to the Dorias of
Genoa and the emperors of Constantinople.]

[Footnote 81: Græci quibus lingua depravata non sit . . . . ita
loquuntur vulgo hâc etiam tempestate ut Aristophanes comicus, aut
Euripides tragicus, ut oratores omnes, ut historiographi, ut philosophi
. . . . litterati autem homines et doctius et emendatius . . . . Nam
viri aulici veterem sermonis dignitatem atque elegantiam retinebant in
primisque ipsænobiles mulieres; quibus cum nullum esset omnino cum viris
peregrinis commercium, merus ille ac purus Græcorum sermo servabatur
intactus, (Philelph. Epist. ad ann. 1451, apud Hodium, p. 188, 189.) He
observes in another passage, uxor illa mea Theodora locutione erat
admodum moderatâet suavi et maxime Atticâ.]

[Footnote 82: Philelphus, absurdly enough, derives this Greek or
Oriental jealousy from the manners of ancient Rome.]

Among the Greeks a numerous and opulent clergy was dedicated to the
service of religion: their monks and bishops have ever been
distinguished by the gravity and austerity of their manners; nor were
they diverted, like the Latin priests, by the pursuits and pleasures of
a secular, and even military, life. After a large deduction for the time
and talent that were lost in the devotion, the laziness, and the
discord, of the church and cloister, the more inquisitive and ambitious
minds would explore the sacred and profane erudition of their native
language. The ecclesiastics presided over the education of youth; the
schools of philosophy and eloquence were perpetuated till the fall of
the empire; and it may be affirmed, that more books and more knowledge
were included within the walls of Constantinople, than could be
dispersed over the extensive countries of the West. ^83 But an important
distinction has been already noticed: the Greeks were stationary or
retrograde, while the Latins were advancing with a rapid and progressive
motion. The nations were excited by the spirit of independence and
emulation; and even the little world of the Italian states contained
more people and industry than the decreasing circle of the Byzantine
empire. In Europe, the lower ranks of society were relieved from the
yoke of feudal servitude; and freedom is the first step to curiosity and
knowledge. The use, however rude and corrupt, of the Latin tongue had
been preserved by superstition; the universities, from Bologna to
Oxford, ^84 were peopled with thousands of scholars; and their misguided
ardor might be directed to more liberal and manly studies. In the
resurrection of science, Italy was the first that cast away her shroud;
and the eloquent Petrarch, by his lessons and his example, may justly be
applauded as the first harbinger of day. A purer style of composition, a
more generous and rational strain of sentiment, flowed from the study
and imitation of the writers of ancient Rome; and the disciples of
Cicero and Virgil approached, with reverence and love, the sanctuary of
their Grecian masters. In the sack of Constantinople, the French, and
even the Venetians, had despised and destroyed the works of Lysippus and
Homer: the monuments of art may be annihilated by a single blow; but the
immortal mind is renewed and multiplied by the copies of the pen; and
such copies it was the ambition of Petrarch and his friends to possess
and understand. The arms of the Turks undoubtedly pressed the flight of
the Muses; yet we may tremble at the thought, that Greece might have
been overwhelmed, with her schools and libraries, before Europe had
emerged from the deluge of barbarism; that the seeds of science might
have been scattered by the winds, before the Italian soil was prepared
for their cultivation.

[Footnote 83: See the state of learning in the xiiith and xivth
centuries, in the learned and judicious Mosheim, (Instit. Hist. Ecclés.
p. 434--440, 490--494.)]

[Footnote 84: At the end of the xvth century, there existed in Europe
about fifty universities, and of these the foundation of ten or twelve
is prior to the year 1300. They were crowded in proportion to their
scarcity. Bologna contained 10,000 students, chiefly of the civil law.
In the year 1357 the number at Oxford had decreased from 30,000 to 6000
scholars, (Henry's History of Great Britain, vol. iv. p. 478.) Yet even
this decrease is much superior to the present list of the members of the
university.]

Chapter LXVI: Union Of The Greek And Latin Churches. -- Part IV.

The most learned Italians of the fifteenth century have confessed and
applauded the restoration of Greek literature, after a long oblivion of
many hundred years. ^85 Yet in that country, and beyond the Alps, some
names are quoted; some profound scholars, who in the darker ages were
honorably distinguished by their knowledge of the Greek tongue; and
national vanity has been loud in the praise of such rare examples of
erudition. Without scrutinizing the merit of individuals, truth must
observe, that their science is without a cause, and without an effect;
that it was easy for them to satisfy themselves and their more ignorant
contemporaries; and that the idiom, which they had so marvellously
acquired was transcribed in few manuscripts, and was not taught in any
university of the West. In a corner of Italy, it faintly existed as the
popular, or at least as the ecclesiastical dialect. ^86 The first
impression of the Doric and Ionic colonies has never been completely
erased: the Calabrian churches were long attached to the throne of
Constantinople: and the monks of St. Basil pursued their studies in
Mount Athos and the schools of the East. Calabria was the native country
of Barlaam, who has already appeared as a sectary and an ambassador; and
Barlaam was the first who revived, beyond the Alps, the memory, or at
least the writings, of Homer. ^87 He is described, by Petrarch and
Boccace, ^88 as a man of diminutive stature, though truly great in the
measure of learning and genius; of a piercing discernment, though of a
slow and painful elocution. For many ages (as they affirm) Greece had
not produced his equal in the knowledge of history, grammar, and
philosophy; and his merit was celebrated in the attestations of the
princes and doctors of Constantinople. One of these attestations is
still extant; and the emperor Cantacuzene, the protector of his
adversaries, is forced to allow, that Euclid, Aristotle, and Plato, were
familiar to that profound and subtle logician. ^89 In the court of
Avignon, he formed an intimate connection with Petrarch, ^90 the first
of the Latin scholars; and the desire of mutual instruction was the
principle of their literary commerce. The Tuscan applied himself with
eager curiosity and assiduous diligence to the study of the Greek
language; and in a laborious struggle with the dryness and difficulty of
the first rudiments, he began to reach the sense, and to feel the
spirit, of poets and philosophers, whose minds were congenial to his
own. But he was soon deprived of the society and lessons of this useful
assistant: Barlaam relinquished his fruitless embassy; and, on his
return to Greece, he rashly provoked the swarms of fanatic monks, by
attempting to substitute the light of reason to that of their navel.
After a separation of three years, the two friends again met in the
court of Naples: but the generous pupil renounced the fairest occasion
of improvement; and by his recommendation Barlaam was finally settled in
a small bishopric of his native Calabria. ^91 The manifold avocations of
Petrarch, love and friendship, his various correspondence and frequent
journeys, the Roman laurel, and his elaborate compositions in prose and
verse, in Latin and Italian, diverted him from a foreign idiom; and as
he advanced in life, the attainment of the Greek language was the object
of his wishes rather than of his hopes. When he was about fifty years of
age, a Byzantine ambassador, his friend, and a master of both tongues,
presented him with a copy of Homer; and the answer of Petrarch is at one
expressive of his eloquence, gratitude, and regret. After celebrating
the generosity of the donor, and the value of a gift more precious in
his estimation than gold or rubies, he thus proceeds: "Your present of
the genuine and original text of the divine poet, the fountain of all
inventions, is worthy of yourself and of me: you have fulfilled your
promise, and satisfied my desires. Yet your liberality is still
imperfect: with Homer you should have given me yourself; a guide, who
could lead me into the fields of light, and disclose to my wondering
eyes the spacious miracles of the Iliad and Odyssey. But, alas! Homer is
dumb, or I am deaf; nor is it in my power to enjoy the beauty which I
possess. I have seated him by the side of Plato, the prince of poets
near the prince of philosophers; and I glory in the sight of my
illustrious guests. Of their immortal writings, whatever had been
translated into the Latin idiom, I had already acquired; but, if there
be no profit, there is some pleasure, in beholding these venerable
Greeks in their proper and national habit. I am delighted with the
aspect of Homer; and as often as I embrace the silent volume, I exclaim
with a sigh, Illustrious bard! with what pleasure should I listen to thy
song, if my sense of hearing were not obstructed and lost by the death
of one friend, and in the much-lamented absence of another. Nor do I yet
despair; and the example of Cato suggests some comfort and hope, since
it was in the last period of age that he attained the knowledge of the
Greek letters." ^92

[Footnote 85: Of those writers who professedly treat of the restoration
of the Greek learning in Italy, the two principal are Hodius, Dr.
Humphrey Hody, (de Græcis Illustribus, LinguæGræcæLiterarumque
humaniorum Instauratoribus; Londini, 1742, in large octavo,) and
Tiraboschi, (Istoria della Letteratura Italiana, tom. v. p. 364--377,
tom. vii. p. 112--143.) The Oxford professor is a laborious scholar, but
the librarian of Modena enjoys the superiority of a modern and national
historian.]

[Footnote 86: In Calabria quæolim magna Græcia dicebatur, coloniis
Græcis repleta, remansit quædam linguæveteris, cognitio, (Hodius, p. 2.)
If it were eradicated by the Romans, it was revived and perpetuated by
the monks of St. Basil, who possessed seven convents at Rossano alone,
(Giannone, Istoria di Napoli, tom. i. p. 520.)]

[Footnote 87: Ii Barbari (says Petrarch, the French and Germans) vix,
non dicam libros sed nomen Homeri audiverunt. Perhaps, in that respect,
the xiiith century was less happy than the age of Charlemagne.]

[Footnote 88: See the character of Barlaam, in Boccace de Genealog.
Deorum, l. xv. c. 6.]

[Footnote 89: Cantacuzen. l. ii. c. 36.]

[Footnote 90: For the connection of Petrarch and Barlaam, and the two
interviews at Avignon in 1339, and at Naples in 1342, see the excellent
Mémoires sur la Vie de Pétrarque, tom. i. p. 406--410, tom. ii. p.
74--77.]

[Footnote 91: The bishopric to which Barlaam retired, was the old Locri,
in the middle ages. Scta. Cyriaca, and by corruption Hieracium, Gerace,
(Dissert. Chorographica ItaliæMedii Ævi, p. 312.) The dives opum of the
Norman times soon lapsed into poverty, since even the church was poor:
yet the town still contains 3000 inhabitants, (Swinburne, p. 340.)]

[Footnote 92: I will transcribe a passage from this epistle of Petrarch,
(Famil. ix. 2;) Donasti Homerum non in alienum sermonem violento alveâ??
derivatum, sed ex ipsis Græci eloquii scatebris, et qualis divino illi
profluxit ingenio . . . . Sine tuâvoce Homerus tuus apud me mutus, immo
vero ego apud illum surdus sum. Gaudeo tamen vel adspectûsolo, ac sæpe
illum amplexus atque suspirans dico, O magne vir, &c.]

The prize which eluded the efforts of Petrarch, was obtained by the
fortune and industry of his friend Boccace, ^93 the father of the Tuscan
prose. That popular writer, who derives his reputation from the
Decameron, a hundred novels of pleasantry and love, may aspire to the
more serious praise of restoring in Italy the study of the Greek
language. In the year one thousand three hundred and sixty, a disciple
of Barlaam, whose name was Leo, or Leontius Pilatus, was detained in his
way to Avignon by the advice and hospitality of Boccace, who lodged the
stranger in his house, prevailed on the republic of Florence to allow
him an annual stipend, and devoted his leisure to the first Greek
professor, who taught that language in the Western countries of Europe.
The appearance of Leo might disgust the most eager disciple, he was
clothed in the mantle of a philosopher, or a mendicant; his countenance
was hideous; his face was overshadowed with black hair; his beard long
an uncombed; his deportment rustic; his temper gloomy and inconstant;
nor could he grace his discourse with the ornaments, or even the
perspicuity, of Latin elocution. But his mind was stored with a treasure
of Greek learning: history and fable, philosophy and grammar, were alike
at his command; and he read the poems of Homer in the schools of
Florence. It was from his explanation that Boccace composed ^* and
transcribed a literal prose version of the Iliad and Odyssey, which
satisfied the thirst of his friend Petrarch, and which, perhaps, in the
succeeding century, was clandestinely used by Laurentius Valla, the
Latin interpreter. It was from his narratives that the same Boccace
collected the materials for his treatise on the genealogy of the heathen
gods, a work, in that age, of stupendous erudition, and which he
ostentatiously sprinkled with Greek characters and passages, to excite
the wonder and applause of his more ignorant readers. ^94 The first
steps of learning are slow and laborious; no more than ten votaries of
Homer could be enumerated in all Italy; and neither Rome, nor Venice,
nor Naples, could add a single name to this studious catalogue. But
their numbers would have multiplied, their progress would have been
accelerated, if the inconstant Leo, at the end of three years, had not
relinquished an honorable and beneficial station. In his passage,
Petrarch entertained him at Padua a short time: he enjoyed the scholar,
but was justly offended with the gloomy and unsocial temper of the man.
Discontented with the world and with himself, Leo depreciated his
present enjoyments, while absent persons and objects were dear to his
imagination. In Italy he was a Thessalian, in Greece a native of
Calabria: in the company of the Latins he disdained their language,
religion, and manners: no sooner was he landed at Constantinople, than
he again sighed for the wealth of Venice and the elegance of Florence.
His Italian friends were deaf to his importunity: he depended on their
curiosity and indulgence, and embarked on a second voyage; but on his
entrance into the Adriatic, the ship was assailed by a tempest, and the
unfortunate teacher, who like Ulysses had fastened himself to the mast,
was struck dead by a flash of lightning. The humane Petrarch dropped a
tear on his disaster; but he was most anxious to learn whether some copy
of Euripides or Sophocles might not be saved from the hands of the
mariners. ^95

[Footnote 93: For the life and writings of Boccace, who was born in
1313, and died in 1375, Fabricius (Bibliot. Latin. Medii Ævi, tom. i. p.
248, &c.) and Tiraboschi (tom. v. p. 83, 439--451) may be consulted. The
editions, versions, imitations of his novels, are innumerable. Yet he
was ashamed to communicate that trifling, and perhaps scandalous, work
to Petrarch, his respectable friend, in whose letters and memoirs he
conspicuously appears.]

[Footnote *: This translation of Homer was by Pilatus, not by Boccacio.
See Hallam, Hist. of Lit. vol. i. p. 132. -- M.]

[Footnote 94: Boccace indulges an honest vanity: Ostentationis
causâGræca carmina adscripsi . . . . jure utor meo; meum est hoc decus,
mea gloria scilicet inter Etruscos Græcis uti carminibus. Nonne ego fui
qui Leontium Pilatum, &c., (de Genealogia Deorum, l. xv. c. 7, a work
which, though now forgotten, has run through thirteen or fourteen
editions.)]

[Footnote 95: Leontius, or Leo Pilatus, is sufficiently made known by
Hody, (p. 2--11,) and the abbéde Sade, (Vie de Pétrarque, tom. iii. p.
625--634, 670--673,) who has very happily caught the lively and dramatic
manner of his original.]

But the faint rudiments of Greek learning, which Petrarch had encouraged
and Boccace had planted, soon withered and expired. The succeeding
generation was content for a while with the improvement of Latin
eloquence; nor was it before the end of the fourteenth century that a
new and perpetual flame was rekindled in Italy. ^96 Previous to his own
journey the emperor Manuel despatched his envoys and orators to implore
the compassion of the Western princes. Of these envoys, the most
conspicuous, or the most learned, was Manuel Chrysoloras, ^97 of noble
birth, and whose Roman ancestors are supposed to have migrated with the
great Constantine. After visiting the courts of France and England,
where he obtained some contributions and more promises, the envoy was
invited to assume the office of a professor; and Florence had again the
honor of this second invitation. By his knowledge, not only of the
Greek, but of the Latin tongue, Chrysoloras deserved the stipend, and
surpassed the expectation, of the republic. His school was frequented by
a crowd of disciples of every rank and age; and one of these, in a
general history, has described his motives and his success. "At that
time," says Leonard Aretin, ^98 "I was a student of the civil law; but
my soul was inflamed with the love of letters; and I bestowed some
application on the sciences of logic and rhetoric. On the arrival of
Manuel, I hesitated whether I should desert my legal studies, or
relinquish this golden opportunity; and thus, in the ardor of youth, I
communed with my own mind -- Wilt thou be wanting to thyself and thy
fortune? Wilt thou refuse to be introduced to a familiar converse with
Homer, Plato, and Demosthenes; with those poets, philosophers, and
orators, of whom such wonders are related, and who are celebrated by
every age as the great masters of human science? Of professors and
scholars in civil law, a sufficient supply will always be found in our
universities; but a teacher, and such a teacher, of the Greek language,
if he once be suffered to escape, may never afterwards be retrieved.
Convinced by these reasons, I gave myself to Chrysoloras; and so strong
was my passion, that the lessons which I had imbibed in the day were the
constant object of my nightly dreams." ^99 At the same time and place,
the Latin classics were explained by John of Ravenna, the domestic pupil
of Petrarch; ^100 the Italians, who illustrated their age and country,
were formed in this double school; and Florence became the fruitful
seminary of Greek and Roman erudition. ^101 The presence of the emperor
recalled Chrysoloras from the college to the court; but he afterwards
taught at Pavia and Rome with equal industry and applause. The remainder
of his life, about fifteen years, was divided between Italy and
Constantinople, between embassies and lessons. In the noble office of
enlightening a foreign nation, the grammarian was not unmindful of a
more sacred duty to his prince and country; and Emanuel Chrysoloras died
at Constance on a public mission from the emperor to the council.

[Footnote 96: Dr. Hody (p. 54) is angry with Leonard Aretin, Guarinus,
Paulus Jovius, &c., for affirming, that the Greek letters were restored
in Italy post septingentos annos; as if, says he, they had flourished
till the end of the viith century. These writers most probably reckoned
from the last period of the exarchate; and the presence of the Greek
magistrates and troops at Ravenna and Rome must have preserved, in some
degree, the use of their native tongue.]

[Footnote 97: See the article of Emanuel, or Manuel Chrysoloras, in Hody
(p 12--54) and Tiraboschi, (tom. vii. p. 113--118.) The precise date of
his arrival floats between the years 1390 and 1400, and is only confined
by the reign of Boniface IX.]

[Footnote 98: The name of Aretinushas been assumed by five or six
natives of Arezzoin Tuscany, of whom the most famous and the most
worthless lived in the xvith century. Leonardus Brunus Aretinus, the
disciple of Chrysoloras, was a linguist, an orator, and an historian,
the secretary of four successive popes, and the chancellor of the
republic of Florence, where he died A.D. 1444, at the age of
seventy-five, (Fabric. Bibliot. Medii Ævi, tom. i. p. 190 &c.
Tiraboschi, tom. vii. p. 33--38.)]

[Footnote 99: See the passage in Aretin. Commentario Rerum suo Tempore
in Italia gestarum, apud Hodium, p. 28--30.]

[Footnote 100: In this domestic discipline, Petrarch, who loved the
youth, often complains of the eager curiosity, restless temper, and
proud feelings, which announce the genius and glory of a riper age,
(Mémoires sur Pétrarque, tom. iii. p. 700--709.)]

[Footnote 101: Hinc GræcæLatinæque scholæexortæsunt, Guarino Philelpho,
Leonardo Aretino, Caroloque, ac plerisque aliis tanquam ex equo Trojano
prodeuntibus, quorum emulatione multa ingenia deinceps ad laudem
excitata sunt, (Platina in Bonifacio IX.) Another Italian writer adds
the names of Paulus Petrus Vergerius, Omnibonus Vincentius, Poggius,
Franciscus Barbarus, &c. But I question whether a rigid chronology would
allow Chrysoloras allthese eminent scholars, (Hodius, p. 25--27, &c.)]

After his example, the restoration of the Greek letters in Italy was
prosecuted by a series of emigrants, who were destitute of fortune, and
endowed with learning, or at least with language. From the terror or
oppression of the Turkish arms, the natives of Thessalonica and
Constantinople escaped to a land of freedom, curiosity, and wealth. The
synod introduced into Florence the lights of the Greek church, and the
oracles of the Platonic philosophy; and the fugitives who adhered to the
union, had the double merit of renouncing their country, not only for
the Christian, but for the catholic cause. A patriot, who sacrifices his
party and conscience to the allurements of favor, may be possessed,
however, of the private and social virtues: he no longer hears the
reproachful epithets of slave and apostate; and the consideration which
he acquires among his new associates will restore in his own eyes the
dignity of his character. The prudent conformity of Bessarion was
rewarded with the Roman purple: he fixed his residence in Italy; and the
Greek cardinal, the titular patriarch of Constantinople, was respected
as the chief and protector of his nation: ^102 his abilities were
exercised in the legations of Bologna, Venice, Germany, and France; and
his election to the chair of St. Peter floated for a moment on the
uncertain breath of a conclave. ^103 His ecclesiastical honors diffused
a splendor and preeminence over his literary merit and service: his
palace was a school; as often as the cardinal visited the Vatican, he
was attended by a learned train of both nations; ^104 of men applauded
by themselves and the public; and whose writings, now overspread with
dust, were popular and useful in their own times. I shall not attempt to
enumerate the restorers of Grecian literature in the fifteenth century;
and it may be sufficient to mention with gratitude the names of Theodore
Gaza, of George of Trebizond, of John Argyropulus, and Demetrius
Chalcocondyles, who taught their native language in the schools of
Florence and Rome. Their labors were not inferior to those of Bessarion,
whose purple they revered, and whose fortune was the secret object of
their envy. But the lives of these grammarians were humble and obscure:
they had declined the lucrative paths of the church; their dress and
manners secluded them from the commerce of the world; and since they
were confined to the merit, they might be content with the rewards, of
learning. From this character, Janus Lascaris ^105 will deserve an
exception. His eloquence, politeness, and Imperial descent, recommended
him to the French monarch; and in the same cities he was alternately
employed to teach and to negotiate. Duty and interest prompted them to
cultivate the study of the Latin language; and the most successful
attained the faculty of writing and speaking with fluency and elegance
in a foreign idiom. But they ever retained the inveterate vanity of
their country: their praise, or at least their esteem, was reserved for
the national writers, to whom they owed their fame and subsistence; and
they sometimes betrayed their contempt in licentious criticism or satire
on Virgil's poetry, and the oratory of Tully. ^106 The superiority of
these masters arose from the familiar use of a living language; and
their first disciples were incapable of discerning how far they had
degenerated from the knowledge, and even the practice of their
ancestors. A vicious pronunciation, ^107 which they introduced, was
banished from the schools by the reason of the succeeding age. Of the
power of the Greek accents they were ignorant; and those musical notes,
which, from an Attic tongue, and to an Attic ear, must have been the
secret soul of harmony, were to their eyes, as to our own, no more than
minute and unmeaning marks, in prose superfluous and troublesome in
verse. The art of grammar they truly possessed; the valuable fragments
of Apollonius and Herodian were transfused into their lessons; and their
treatises of syntax and etymology, though devoid of philosophic spirit,
are still useful to the Greek student. In the shipwreck of the Byzantine
libraries, each fugitive seized a fragment of treasure, a copy of some
author, who without his industry might have perished: the transcripts
were multiplied by an assiduous, and sometimes an elegant pen; and the
text was corrected and explained by their own comments, or those of the
elder scholiasts. The sense, though not the spirit, of the Greek
classics, was interpreted to the Latin world: the beauties of style
evaporate in a version; but the judgment of Theodore Gaza selected the
more solid works of Aristotle and Theophrastus, and their natural
histories of animals and plants opened a rich fund of genuine and
experimental science.

[Footnote 102: See in Hody the article of Bessarion, (p. 136--177.)
Theodore Gaza, George of Trebizond, aud the rest of the Greeks whom I
have named or omitted, are inserted in their proper chapters of his
learned work. See likewise Tiraboschi, in the 1st and 2d parts of the
vith tome.]

[Footnote 103: The cardinals knocked at his door, but his conclavist
refused to interrupt the studies of Bessarion: "Nicholas," said he, "thy
respect has cost thee a hat, and me the tiara." *

Note: * Roscoe (Life of Lorenzo de Medici, vol. i. p. 75) considers that
Hody has refuted this "idle tale." -- M.]

[Footnote 104: Such as George of Trebizond, Theodore Gaza, Argyropulus,
Andronicus of Thessalonica, Philelphus, Poggius, Blondus, Nicholas
Perrot, Valla, Campanus, Platina, &c. Viri (says Hody, with the pious
zeal of a scholar) nullo ævo perituri, p. 156.)]

[Footnote 105: He was born before the taking of Constantinople, but his
honorable life was stretched far into the xvith century, (A.D. 1535.)
Leo X. and Francis I. were his noblest patrons, under whose auspices he
founded the Greek colleges of Rome and Paris, (Hody, p. 247--275.) He
left posterity in France; but the counts de Vintimille, and their
numerous branches, derive the name of Lascaris from a doubtful marriage
in the xiiith century with the daughter of a Greek emperor (Ducange,
Fam. Byzant. p. 224--230.)]

[Footnote 106: Two of his epigrams against Virgil, and three against
Tully, are preserved and refuted by Franciscus Floridus, who can find no
better names than Græculus ineptus et impudens, (Hody, p. 274.) In our
own times, an English critic has accused the Æneid of containing multa
languida, nugatoria, spiritûet majestate carminis heroici defecta; many
such verses as he, the said Jeremiah Markland, would have been ashamed
of owning, (præfat. ad Statii Sylvas, p. 21, 22.)]

[Footnote 107: Emanuel Chrysoloras, and his colleagues, are accused of
ignorance, envy, or avarice, (Sylloge, &c., tom. ii. p. 235.) The modern
Greeks pronounce the b as a V consonant, and confound three vowels, (h i
u,) and several diphthongs. Such was the vulgar pronunciation which the
stern Gardiner maintained by penal statutes in the university of
Cambridge: but the monosyllable bh represented to an Attic ear the
bleating of sheep, and a bellwether is better evidence than a bishop or
a chancellor. The treatises of those scholars, particularly Erasmus, who
asserted a more classical pronunciation, are collected in the Sylloge of
Havercamp, (2 vols. in octavo, Lugd. Bat. 1736, 1740:) but it is
difficult to paint sounds by words: and in their reference to modern
use, they can be understood only by their respective countrymen. We may
observe, that our peculiar pronunciation of the O, th, is approved by
Erasmus, (tom. ii. p. 130.)]

Yet the fleeting shadows of metaphysics were pursued with more curiosity
and ardor. After a long oblivion, Plato was revived in Italy by a
venerable Greek, ^108 who taught in the house of Cosmo of Medicis. While
the synod of Florence was involved in theological debate, some
beneficial consequences might flow from the study of his elegant
philosophy: his style is the purest standard of the Attic dialect, and
his sublime thoughts are sometimes adapted to familiar conversation, and
sometimes adorned with the richest colors of poetry and eloquence. The
dialogues of Plato are a dramatic picture of the life and death of a
sage; and, as often as he descends from the clouds, his moral system
inculcates the love of truth, of our country, and of mankind. The
precept and example of Socrates recommended a modest doubt and liberal
inquiry; and if the Platonists, with blind devotion, adored the visions
and errors of their divine master, their enthusiasm might correct the
dry, dogmatic method of the Peripatetic school. So equal, yet so
opposite, are the merits of Plato and Aristotle, that they may be
balanced in endless controversy; but some spark of freedom may be
produced by the collision of adverse servitude. The modern Greeks were
divided between the two sects: with more fury than skill they fought
under the banner of their leaders; and the field of battle was removed
in their flight from Constantinople to Rome. But this philosophical
debate soon degenerated into an angry and personal quarrel of
grammarians; and Bessarion, though an advocate for Plato, protected the
national honor, by interposing the advice and authority of a mediator.
In the gardens of the Medici, the academical doctrine was enjoyed by the
polite and learned: but their philosophic society was quickly dissolved;
and if the writings of the Attic sage were perused in the closet, the
more powerful Stagyrite continued to reign, the oracle of the church and
school. ^109

[Footnote 108: George Gemistus Pletho, a various and voluminous writer,
the master of Bessarion, and all the Platonists of the times. He visited
Italy in his old age, and soon returned to end his days in Peloponnesus.
See the curious Diatribe of Leo Allatius de Georgiis, in Fabricius.
(Bibliot. Græc. tom. x. p. 739--756.)]

[Footnote 109: The state of the Platonic philosophy in Italy is
illustrated by Boivin, (Mém. de l'Acad. des Inscriptions, tom. ii. p.
715--729,) and Tiraboschi, (tom. vi. P. i. p. 259--288.)]

I have fairly represented the literary merits of the Greeks; yet it must
be confessed, that they were seconded and surpassed by the ardor of the
Latins. Italy was divided into many independent states; and at that time
it was the ambition of princes and republics to vie with each other in
the encouragement and reward of literature. The fame of Nicholas the
Fifth ^110 has not been adequate to his merits. From a plebeian origin
he raised himself by his virtue and learning: the character of the man
prevailed over the interest of the pope; and he sharpened those weapons
which were soon pointed against the Roman church. ^111 He had been the
friend of the most eminent scholars of the age: he became their patron;
and such was the humility of his manners, that the change was scarcely
discernible either to them or to himself. If he pressed the acceptance
of a liberal gift, it was not as the measure of desert, but as the proof
of benevolence; and when modest merit declined his bounty, "Accept it,"
would he say, with a consciousness of his own worth: "ye will not always
have a Nicholas among you." The influence of the holy see pervaded
Christendom; and he exerted that influence in the search, not of
benefices, but of books. From the ruins of the Byzantine libraries, from
the darkest monasteries of Germany and Britain, he collected the dusty
manuscripts of the writers of antiquity; and wherever the original could
not be removed, a faithful copy was transcribed and transmitted for his
use. The Vatican, the old repository for bulls and legends, for
superstition and forgery, was daily replenished with more precious
furniture; and such was the industry of Nicholas, that in a reign of
eight years he formed a library of five thousand volumes. To his
munificence the Latin world was indebted for the versions of Xenophon,
Diodorus, Polybius, Thucydides, Herodotus, and Appian; of Strabo's
Geography, of the Iliad, of the most valuable works of Plato and
Aristotle, of Ptolemy and Theophrastus, and of the fathers of the Greek
church. The example of the Roman pontiff was preceded or imitated by a
Florentine merchant, who governed the republic without arms and without
a title. Cosmo of Medicis ^112 was the father of a line of princes,
whose name and age are almost synonymous with the restoration of
learning: his credit was ennobled into fame; his riches were dedicated
to the service of mankind; he corresponded at once with Cairo and
London: and a cargo of Indian spices and Greek books was often imported
in the same vessel. The genius and education of his grandson Lorenzo
rendered him not only a patron, but a judge and candidate, in the
literary race. In his palace, distress was entitled to relief, and merit
to reward: his leisure hours were delightfully spent in the Platonic
academy; he encouraged the emulation of Demetrius Chalcocondyles and
Angelo Politian; and his active missionary Janus Lascaris returned from
the East with a treasure of two hundred manuscripts, fourscore of which
were as yet unknown in the libraries of Europe. ^113 The rest of Italy
was animated by a similar spirit, and the progress of the nation repaid
the liberality of their princes. The Latins held the exclusive property
of their own literature; and these disciples of Greece were soon capable
of transmitting and improving the lessons which they had imbibed. After
a short succession of foreign teachers, the tide of emigration subsided;
but the language of Constantinople was spread beyond the Alps and the
natives of France, Germany, and England, ^114 imparted to their country
the sacred fire which they had kindled in the schools of Florence and
Rome. ^115 In the productions of the mind, as in those of the soil, the
gifts of nature are excelled by industry and skill: the Greek authors,
forgotten on the banks of the Ilissus, have been illustrated on those of
the Elbe and the Thames: and Bessarion or Gaza might have envied the
superior science of the Barbarians; the accuracy of Budæus, the taste of
Erasmus, the copiousness of Stephens, the erudition of Scaliger, the
discernment of Reiske, or of Bentley. On the side of the Latins, the
discovery of printing was a casual advantage: but this useful art has
been applied by Aldus, and his innumerable successors, to perpetuate and
multiply the works of antiquity. ^116 A single manuscript imported from
Greece is revived in ten thousand copies; and each copy is fairer than
the original. In this form, Homer and Plato would peruse with more
satisfaction their own writings; and their scholiasts must resign the
prize to the labors of our Western editors.

[Footnote 110: See the Life of Nicholas V. by two contemporary authors,
Janottus Manettus, (tom. iii. P. ii. p. 905--962,) and Vespasian of
Florence, (tom. xxv. p. 267--290,) in the collection of Muratori; and
consult Tiraboschi, (tom. vi. P. i. p. 46--52, 109,) and Hody in the
articles of Theodore Gaza, George of Trebizond, &c.]

[Footnote 111: Lord Bolingbroke observes, with truth and spirit, that
the popes in this instance, were worse politicians than the muftis, and
that the charm which had bound mankind for so many ages was broken by
the magicians themselves, (Letters on the Study of History, l. vi. p.
165, 166, octavo edition, 1779.)]

[Footnote 112: See the literary history of Cosmo and Lorenzo of Medicis,
in Tiraboschi, (tom. vi. P. i. l. i. c. 2,) who bestows a due measure of
praise on Alphonso of Arragon, king of Naples, the dukes of Milan,
Ferrara Urbino, &c. The republic of Venice has deserved the least from
the gratitude of scholars.]

[Footnote 113: Tiraboschi, (tom. vi. P. i. p. 104,) from the preface of
Janus Lascaris to the Greek Anthology, printed at Florence, 1494.
Latebant (says Aldus in his preface to the Greek orators, apud Hodium,
p. 249) in Atho Thraciæmonte. Eas Lascaris . . . . in Italiam
reportavit. Miserat enim ipsum Laurentius ille Medices in Græciam ad
inquirendos simul, et quantovis emendos pretio bonos libros. It is
remarkable enough, that the research was facilitated by Sultan Bajazet
II.]

[Footnote 114: The Greek language was introduced into the university of
Oxford in the last years of the xvth century, by Grocyn, Linacer, and
Latimer, who had all studied at Florence under Demetrius Chalcocondyles.
See Dr. Knight's curious Life of Erasmus. Although a stout academical
patriot, he is forced to acknowledge that Erasmus learned Greek at
Oxford, and taught it at Cambridge.]

[Footnote 115: The jealous Italians were desirous of keeping a monopoly
of Greek learning. When Aldus was about to publish the Greek scholiasts
on Sophocles and Euripides, Cave, (said they,) cave hoc facias, ne
Barbariistis adjuti domi maneant, et pauciores in Italiam ventitent,
(Dr. Knight, in his Life of Erasmus, p. 365, from Beatus Rhemanus.)]

[Footnote 116: The press of Aldus Manutius, a Roman, was established at
Venice about the year 1494: he printed above sixty considerable works of
Greek literature, almost all for the first time; several containing
different treatises and authors, and of several authors, two, three, or
four editions, (Fabric. Bibliot. Græc. tom. xiii. p. 605, &c.) Yet his
glory must not tempt us to forget, that the first Greek book, the
Grammar of Constantine Lascaris, was printed at Milan in 1476; and that
the Florence Homer of 1488 displays all the luxury of the typographical
art. See the Annales Typographical of Mattaire, and the Bibliographie
Instructive of De Bure, a knowing bookseller of Paris.]

Before the revival of classic literature, the Barbarians in Europe were
immersed in ignorance; and their vulgar tongues were marked with the
rudeness and poverty of their manners. The students of the more perfect
idioms of Rome and Greece were introduced to a new world of light and
science; to the society of the free and polished nations of antiquity;
and to a familiar converse with those immortal men who spoke the sublime
language of eloquence and reason. Such an intercourse must tend to
refine the taste, and to elevate the genius, of the moderns; and yet,
from the first experiments, it might appear that the study of the
ancients had given fetters, rather than wings, to the human mind.
However laudable, the spirit of imitation is of a servile cast; and the
first disciples of the Greeks and Romans were a colony of strangers in
the midst of their age and country. The minute and laborious diligence
which explored the antiquities of remote times might have improved or
adorned the present state of society, the critic and metaphysician were
the slaves of Aristotle; the poets, historians, and orators, were proud
to repeat the thoughts and words of the Augustan age: the works of
nature were observed with the eyes of Pliny and Theophrastus; and some
Pagan votaries professed a secret devotion to the gods of Homer and
Plato. ^117 The Italians were oppressed by the strength and number of
their ancient auxiliaries: the century after the deaths of Petrarch and
Boccace was filled with a crowd of Latin imitators, who decently repose
on our shelves; but in that æra of learning it will not be easy to
discern a real discovery of science, a work of invention or eloquence,
in the popular language of the country. ^118 But as soon as it had been
deeply saturated with the celestial dew, the soil was quickened into
vegetation and life; the modern idioms were refined; the classics of
Athens and Rome inspired a pure taste and a generous emulation; and in
Italy, as afterwards in France and England, the pleasing reign of poetry
and fiction was succeeded by the light of speculative and experimental
philosophy. Genius may anticipate the season of maturity; but in the
education of a people, as in that of an individual, memory must be
exercised, before the powers of reason and fancy can be expanded: nor
may the artist hope to equal or surpass, till he has learned to imitate,
the works of his predecessors.

[Footnote 117: I will select three singular examples of this classic
enthusiasm. I. At the synod of Florence, Gemistus Pletho said, in
familiar conversation to George of Trebizond, that in a short time
mankind would unanimously renounce the Gospel and the Koran, for a
religion similar to that of the Gentiles, (Leo Allatius, apud Fabricium,
tom. x. p. 751.) 2. Paul II. persecuted the Roman academy, which had
been founded by Pomponius Lætus; and the principal members were accused
of heresy, impiety, and paganism, (Tiraboschi, tom. vi. P. i. p. 81,
82.) 3. In the next century, some scholars and poets in France
celebrated the success of Jodelle's tragedy of Cleopatra, by a festival
of Bacchus, and, as it is said, by the sacrifice of a goat, (Bayle,
Dictionnaire, Jodelle. Fontenelle, tom. iii. p. 56--61.) Yet the spirit
of bigotry might often discern a serious impiety in the sportive play of
fancy and learning.]

[Footnote 118: The survivor Boccace died in the year 1375; and we cannot
place before 1480 the composition of the Morgante Maggiore of Pulci and
the Orlando Innamorato of Boyardo, (Tiraboschi, tom. vi. P. ii. p.
174--177.)]

Chapter LXVII: Schism Of The Greeks And Latins.Part I.

Schism Of The Greeks And Latins. -- Reign And Character Of Amurath The
Second. -- Crusade Of Ladislaus, King Of Hungary. -- His Defeat And
Death. -- John Huniades. -- Scanderbeg. -- Constantine Palæologus, Last
Emperor Of The East.

The respective merits of Rome and Constantinople are compared and
celebrated by an eloquent Greek, the father of the Italian schools. ^1
The view of the ancient capital, the seat of his ancestors, surpassed
the most sanguine expectations of Emanuel Chrysoloras; and he no longer
blamed the exclamation of an old sophist, that Rome was the habitation,
not of men, but of gods. Those gods, and those men, had long since
vanished; but to the eye of liberal enthusiasm, the majesty of ruin
restored the image of her ancient prosperity. The monuments of the
consuls and Cæsars, of the martyrs and apostles, engaged on all sides
the curiosity of the philosopher and the Christian; and he confessed
that in every age the arms and the religion of Rome were destined to
reign over the earth. While Chrysoloras admired the venerable beauties
of the mother, he was not forgetful of his native country, her fairest
daughter, her Imperial colony; and the Byzantine patriot expatiates with
zeal and truth on the eternal advantages of nature, and the more
transitory glories of art and dominion, which adorned, or had adorned,
the city of Constantine. Yet the perfection of the copy still redounds
(as he modestly observes) to the honor of the original, and parents are
delighted to be renewed, and even excelled, by the superior merit of
their children. "Constantinople," says the orator, "is situate on a
commanding point, between Europe and Asia, between the Archipelago and
the Euxine. By her interposition, the two seas, and the two continents,
are united for the common benefit of nations; and the gates of commerce
may be shut or opened at her command. The harbor, encompassed on all
sides by the sea, and the continent, is the most secure and capacious in
the world. The walls and gates of Constantinople may be compared with
those of Babylon: the towers many; each tower is a solid and lofty
structure; and the second wall, the outer fortification, would be
sufficient for the defence and dignity of an ordinary capital. A broad
and rapid stream may be introduced into the ditches and the artificial
island may be encompassed, like Athens, ^2 by land or water." Two strong
and natural causes are alleged for the perfection of the model of new
Rome. The royal founder reigned over the most illustrious nations of the
globe; and in the accomplishment of his designs, the power of the Romans
was combined with the art and science of the Greeks. Other cities have
been reared to maturity by accident and time: their beauties are mingled
with disorder and deformity; and the inhabitants, unwilling to remove
from their natal spot, are incapable of correcting the errors of their
ancestors, and the original vices of situation or climate. But the free
idea of Constantinople was formed and executed by a single mind; and the
primitive model was improved by the obedient zeal of the subjects and
successors of the first monarch. The adjacent isles were stored with an
inexhaustible supply of marble; but the various materials were
transported from the most remote shores of Europe and Asia; and the
public and private buildings, the palaces, churches, aqueducts,
cisterns, porticos, columns, baths, and hippodromes, were adapted to the
greatness of the capital of the East. The superfluity of wealth was
spread along the shores of Europe and Asia; and the Byzantine territory,
as far as the Euxine, the Hellespont, and the long wall, might be
considered as a populous suburb and a perpetual garden. In this
flattering picture, the past and the present, the times of prosperity
and decay, are art fully confounded; but a sigh and a confession escape,
from the orator, that his wretched country was the shadow and sepulchre
of its former self. The works of ancient sculpture had been defaced by
Christian zeal or Barbaric violence; the fairest structures were
demolished; and the marbles of Paros or Numidia were burnt for lime, or
applied to the meanest uses. Of many a statue, the place was marked by
an empty pedestal; of many a column, the size was determined by a broken
capital; the tombs of the emperors were scattered on the ground; the
stroke of time was accelerated by storms and earthquakes; and the vacant
space was adorned, by vulgar tradition, with fabulous monuments of gold
and silver. From these wonders, which lived only in memory or belief, he
distinguishes, however, the porphyry pillar, the column and colossus of
Justinian, ^3 and the church, more especially the dome, of St. Sophia;
the best conclusion, since it could not be described according to its
merits, and after it no other object could deserve to be mentioned. But
he forgets that, a century before, the trembling fabrics of the colossus
and the church had been saved and supported by the timely care of
Andronicus the Elder. Thirty years after the emperor had fortified St.
Sophia with two new buttresses or pyramids, the eastern hemisphere
suddenly gave way: and the images, the altars, and the sanctuary, were
crushed by the falling ruin. The mischief indeed was speedily repaired;
the rubbish was cleared by the incessant labor of every rank and age;
and the poor remains of riches and industry were consecrated by the
Greeks to the most stately and venerable temple of the East. ^4

[Footnote 1: The epistle of Emanuel Chrysoloras to the emperor John
Palæologus will not offend the eye or ear of a classical student, (ad
calcem Codini de Antiquitatibus C. P. p. 107--126.) The superscription
suggests a chronological remark, that John Palæologus II. was associated
in the empire before the year 1414, the date of Chrysoloras's death. A
still earlier date, at least 1408, is deduced from the age of his
youngest sons, Demetrius and Thomas, who were both
Porphyrogeniti(Ducange, Fam. Byzant. p. 244, 247.)]

[Footnote 2: Somebody observed that the city of Athens might be
circumnavigated, (tiV eipen tin polin tvn Aqhnaiwn dunasqai kai
paraplein kai periplein.) But what may be true in a rhetorical sense of
Constantinople, cannot be applied to the situation of Athens, five miles
from the sea, and not intersected or surrounded by any navigable
streams.]

[Footnote 3: Nicephorus Gregoras has described the Colossus of
Justinian, (l. vii. 12:) but his measures are false and inconsistent.
The editor Boivin consulted his friend Girardon; and the sculptor gave
him the true proportions of an equestrian statue. That of Justinian was
still visible to Peter Gyllius, not on the column, but in the outward
court of the seraglio; and he was at Constantinople when it was melted
down, and cast into a brass cannon, (de Topograph. C. P. l. ii. c. 17.)]

[Footnote 4: See the decay and repairs of St. Sophia, in Nicephorus
Gregoras (l. vii. 12, l. xv. 2.) The building was propped by Andronicus
in 1317, the eastern hemisphere fell in 1345. The Greeks, in their
pompous rhetoric, exalt the beauty and holiness of the church, an
earthly heaven the abode of angels, and of God himself, &c.]

The last hope of the falling city and empire was placed in the harmony
of the mother and daughter, in the maternal tenderness of Rome, and the
filial obedience of Constantinople. In the synod of Florence, the Greeks
and Latins had embraced, and subscribed, and promised; but these signs
of friendship were perfidious or fruitless; ^5 and the baseless fabric
of the union vanished like a dream. ^6 The emperor and his prelates
returned home in the Venetian galleys; but as they touched at the Morea
and the Isles of Corfu and Lesbos, the subjects of the Latins complained
that the pretended union would be an instrument of oppression. No sooner
did they land on the Byzantine shore, than they were saluted, or rather
assailed, with a general murmur of zeal and discontent. During their
absence, above two years, the capital had been deprived of its civil and
ecclesiastical rulers; fanaticism fermented in anarchy; the most furious
monks reigned over the conscience of women and bigots; and the hatred of
the Latin name was the first principle of nature and religion. Before
his departure for Italy, the emperor had flattered the city with the
assurance of a prompt relief and a powerful succor; and the clergy,
confident in their orthodoxy and science, had promised themselves and
their flocks an easy victory over the blind shepherds of the West. The
double disappointment exasperated the Greeks; the conscience of the
subscribing prelates was awakened; the hour of temptation was past; and
they had more to dread from the public resentment, than they could hope
from the favor of the emperor or the pope. Instead of justifying their
conduct, they deplored their weakness, professed their contrition, and
cast themselves on the mercy of God and of their brethren. To the
reproachful question, what had been the event or the use of their
Italian synod? they answered with sighs and tears, "Alas! we have made a
new faith; we have exchanged piety for impiety; we have betrayed the
immaculate sacrifice; and we are become Azymites." (The Azymites were
those who celebrated the communion with unleavened bread; and I must
retract or qualify the praise which I have bestowed on the growing
philosophy of the times.) "Alas! we have been seduced by distress, by
fraud, and by the hopes and fears of a transitory life. The hand that
has signed the union should be cut off; and the tongue that has
pronounced the Latin creed deserves to be torn from the root." The best
proof of their repentance was an increase of zeal for the most trivial
rites and the most incomprehensible doctrines; and an absolute
separation from all, without excepting their prince, who preserved some
regard for honor and consistency. After the decease of the patriarch
Joseph, the archbishops of Heraclea and Trebizond had courage to refuse
the vacant office; and Cardinal Bessarion preferred the warm and
comfortable shelter of the Vatican. The choice of the emperor and his
clergy was confined to Metrophanes of Cyzicus: he was consecrated in St.
Sophia, but the temple was vacant. The cross-bearers abdicated their
service; the infection spread from the city to the villages; and
Metrophanes discharged, without effect, some ecclesiastical thunders
against a nation of schismatics. The eyes of the Greeks were directed to
Mark of Ephesus, the champion of his country; and the sufferings of the
holy confessor were repaid with a tribute of admiration and applause.
His example and writings propagated the flame of religious discord; age
and infirmity soon removed him from the world; but the gospel of Mark
was not a law of forgiveness; and he requested with his dying breath,
that none of the adherents of Rome might attend his obsequies or pray
for his soul.

[Footnote 5: The genuine and original narrative of Syropulus (p.
312--351) opens the schism from the first officeof the Greeks at Venice
to the general opposition at Constantinople, of the clergy and people.]

[Footnote 6: On the schism of Constantinople, see Phranza, (l. ii. c.
17,) Laonicus Chalcondyles, (l. vi. p. 155, 156,) and Ducas, (c. 31;)
the last of whom writes with truth and freedom. Among the moderns we may
distinguish the continuator of Fleury, (tom. xxii. p. 338, &c., 401,
420, &c.,) and Spondanus, (A.D. 1440--50.) The sense of the latter is
drowned in prejudice and passion, as soon as Rome and religion are
concerned.]

The schism was not confined to the narrow limits of the Byzantine
empire. Secure under the Mamaluke sceptre, the three patriarchs of
Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem, assembled a numerous synod; disowned
their representatives at Ferrara and Florence; condemned the creed and
council of the Latins; and threatened the emperor of Constantinople with
the censures of the Eastern church. Of the sectaries of the Greek
communion, the Russians were the most powerful, ignorant, and
superstitious. Their primate, the cardinal Isidore, hastened from
Florence to Moscow, ^7 to reduce the independent nation under the Roman
yoke. But the Russian bishops had been educated at Mount Athos; and the
prince and people embraced the theology of their priests. They were
scandalized by the title, the pomp, the Latin cross of the legate, the
friend of those impious men who shaved their beards, and performed the
divine office with gloves on their hands and rings on their fingers:
Isidore was condemned by a synod; his person was imprisoned in a
monastery; and it was with extreme difficulty that the cardinal could
escape from the hands of a fierce and fanatic people. ^8 The Russians
refused a passage to the missionaries of Rome who aspired to convert the
Pagans beyond the Tanais; ^9 and their refusal was justified by the
maxim, that the guilt of idolatry is less damnable than that of schism.
The errors of the Bohemians were excused by their abhorrence for the
pope; and a deputation of the Greek clergy solicited the friendship of
those sanguinary enthusiasts. ^10 While Eugenius triumphed in the union
and orthodoxy of the Greeks, his party was contracted to the walls, or
rather to the palace of Constantinople. The zeal of Palæologus had been
excited by interest; it was soon cooled by opposition: an attempt to
violate the national belief might endanger his life and crown; not could
the pious rebels be destitute of foreign and domestic aid. The sword of
his brother Demetrius, who in Italy had maintained a prudent and popular
silence, was half unsheathed in the cause of religion; and Amurath, the
Turkish sultan, was displeased and alarmed by the seeming friendship of
the Greeks and Latins.

[Footnote 7: Isidore was metropolitan of Kiow, but the Greeks subject to
Poland have removed that see from the ruins of Kiow to Lemberg, or
Leopold, (Herbestein, in Ramusio, tom. ii. p. 127.) On the other hand,
the Russians transferred their spiritual obedience to the archbishop,
who became, in 1588, the patriarch, of Moscow, (Levesque Hist. de
Russie, tom. iii. p. 188, 190, from a Greek MS. at Turin, Iter et
labores Archiepiscopi Arsenii.)]

[Footnote 8: The curious narrative of Levesque (Hist. de Russie, tom.
ii. p. 242--247) is extracted from the patriarchal archives. The scenes
of Ferrara and Florence are described by ignorance and passion; but the
Russians are credible in the account of their own prejudices.]

[Footnote 9: The Shamanism, the ancient religion of the Samanæans and
Gymnosophists, has been driven by the more popular Bramins from India
into the northern deserts: the naked philosophers were compelled to wrap
themselves in fur; but they insensibly sunk into wizards and physicians.
The Mordvans and Tcheremisses in the European Russia adhere to this
religion, which is formed on the earthly model of one king or God, his
ministers or angels, and the rebellious spirits who oppose his
government. As these tribes of the Volga have no images, they might more
justly retort on the Latin missionaries the name of idolaters,
(Levesque, Hist. des Peuples soumis àla Domination des Russes, tom. i.
p. 194--237, 423--460.)]

[Footnote 10: Spondanus, Annal. Eccles. tom ii. A.D. 1451, No. 13. The
epistle of the Greeks with a Latin version, is extant in the college
library at Prague.]

"Sultan Murad, or Amurath, lived forty-nine, and reigned thirty years,
six months, and eight days. He was a just and valiant prince, of a great
soul, patient of labors, learned, merciful, religious, charitable; a
lover and encourager of the studious, and of all who excelled in any art
or science; a good emperor and a great general. No man obtained more or
greater victories than Amurath; Belgrade alone withstood his attacks. ^*
Under his reign, the soldier was ever victorious, the citizen rich and
secure. If he subdued any country, his first care was to build mosques
and caravansaras, hospitals, and colleges. Every year he gave a thousand
pieces of gold to the sons of the Prophet; and sent two thousand five
hundred to the religious persons of Mecca, Medina, and Jerusalem." ^11
This portrait is transcribed from the historian of the Othman empire:
but the applause of a servile and superstitious people has been lavished
on the worst of tyrants; and the virtues of a sultan are often the vices
most useful to himself, or most agreeable to his subjects. A nation
ignorant of the equal benefits of liberty and law, must be awed by the
flashes of arbitrary power: the cruelty of a despot will assume the
character of justice; his profusion, of liberality; his obstinacy, of
firmness. If the most reasonable excuse be rejected, few acts of
obedience will be found impossible; and guilt must tremble, where
innocence cannot always be secure. The tranquillity of the people, and
the discipline of the troops, were best maintained by perpetual action
in the field; war was the trade of the Janizaries; and those who
survived the peril, and divided the spoil, applauded the generous
ambition of their sovereign. To propagate the true religion, was the
duty of a faithful Mussulman: the unbelievers were hisenemies, and those
of the Prophet; and, in the hands of the Turks, the cimeter was the only
instrument of conversion. Under these circumstances, however, the
justice and moderation of Amurath are attested by his conduct, and
acknowledged by the Christians themselves; who consider a prosperous
reign and a peaceful death as the reward of his singular merits. In the
vigor of his age and military power, he seldom engaged in war till he
was justified by a previous and adequate provocation: the victorious
sultan was disarmed by submission; and in the observance of treaties,
his word was inviolate and sacred. ^12 The Hungarians were commonly the
aggressors; he was provoked by the revolt of Scanderbeg; and the
perfidious Caramanian was twice vanquished, and twice pardoned, by the
Ottoman monarch. Before he invaded the Morea, Thebes had been surprised
by the despot: in the conquest of Thessalonica, the grandson of Bajazet
might dispute the recent purchase of the Venetians; and after the first
siege of Constantinople, the sultan was never tempted, by the distress,
the absence, or the injuries of Palæologus, to extinguish the dying
light of the Byzantine empire.

[Footnote *: See the siege and massacre at Thessalonica. Von Hammer vol.
i p. 433. -- M.]

[Footnote 11: See Cantemir, History of the Othman Empire, p. 94. Murad,
or Morad, may be more correct: but I have preferred the popular name to
that obscure diligence which is rarely successful in translating an
Oriental, into the Roman, alphabet.]

[Footnote 12: See Chalcondyles, (l. vii. p. 186, 198,) Ducas, (c. 33,)
and Marinus Barletius, (in Vit. Scanderbeg, p. 145, 146.) In his good
faith towards the garrison of Sfetigrade, he was a lesson and example to
his son Mahomet.]

But the most striking feature in the life and character of Amurath is
the double abdication of the Turkish throne; and, were not his motives
debased by an alloy of superstition, we must praise the royal
philosopher, ^13 who at the age of forty could discern the vanity of
human greatness. Resigning the sceptre to his son, he retired to the
pleasant residence of Magnesia; but he retired to the society of saints
and hermits. It was not till the fourth century of the Hegira, that the
religion of Mahomet had been corrupted by an institution so adverse to
his genius; but in the age of the crusades, the various orders of
Dervises were multiplied by the example of the Christian, and even the
Latin, monks. ^14 The lord of nations submitted to fast, and pray, and
turn round ^* in endless rotation with the fanatics, who mistook the
giddiness of the head for the illumination of the spirit. ^15 But he was
soon awakened from his dreams of enthusiasm by the Hungarian invasion;
and his obedient son was the foremost to urge the public danger and the
wishes of the people. Under the banner of their veteran leader, the
Janizaries fought and conquered but he withdrew from the field of Varna,
again to pray, to fast, and to turn round with his Magnesian brethren.
These pious occupations were again interrupted by the danger of the
state. A victorious army disdained the inexperience of their youthful
ruler: the city of Adrianople was abandoned to rapine and slaughter; and
the unanimous divan implored his presence to appease the tumult, and
prevent the rebellion, of the Janizaries. At the well-known voice of
their master, they trembled and obeyed; and the reluctant sultan was
compelled to support his splendid servitude, till at the end of four
years, he was relieved by the angel of death. Age or disease, misfortune
or caprice, have tempted several princes to descend from the throne; and
they have had leisure to repent of their irretrievable step. But Amurath
alone, in the full liberty of choice, after the trial of empire and
solitude, has repeatedhis preference of a private life.

[Footnote 13: Voltaire (Essai sur l'Histoire Générale, c. 89, p. 283,
284) admires le Philosophe Turc:would he have bestowed the same praise
on a Christian prince for retiring to a monastery? In his way, Voltaire
was a bigot, an intolerant bigot.]

[Footnote 14: See the articles Dervische, Fakir, Nasser, Rohbaniat, in
D'Herbelot's Bibliothèque Orientale. Yet the subject is superficially
treated from the Persian and Arabian writers. It is among the Turks that
these orders have principally flourished.]

[Footnote *: Gibbon has fallen into a remarkable error. The unmonastic
retreat of Amurath was that of an epicurean rather than of a dervis;
more like that of Sardanapalus than of Charles the Fifth. Profane, not
divine, love was its chief occupation: the only dance, that described by
Horace as belonging to the country, motus doceri gaudet Ionicos. See Von
Hammer note, p. 652. -- M.]

[Footnote 15: Ricaut (in the Present State of the Ottoman Empire, p.
242--268) affords much information, which he drew from his personal
conversation with the heads of the dervises, most of whom ascribed their
origin to the time of Orchan. He does not mention the Zichidof
Chalcondyles, (l. vii. p. 286,) among whom Amurath retired: the Seidsof
that author are the descendants of Mahomet.]

After the departure of his Greek brethren, Eugenius had not been
unmindful of their temporal interest; and his tender regard for the
Byzantine empire was animated by a just apprehension of the Turks, who
approached, and might soon invade, the borders of Italy. But the spirit
of the crusades had expired; and the coldness of the Franks was not less
unreasonable than their headlong passion. In the eleventh century, a
fanatic monk could precipitate Europe on Asia for the recovery of the
holy sepulchre; but in the fifteenth, the most pressing motives of
religion and policy were insufficient to unite the Latins in the defence
of Christendom. Germany was an inexhaustible storehouse of men and arms:
^16 but that complex and languid body required the impulse of a vigorous
hand; and Frederic the Third was alike impotent in his personal
character and his Imperial dignity. A long war had impaired the
strength, without satiating the animosity, of France and England: ^17
but Philip duke of Burgundy was a vain and magnificent prince; and he
enjoyed, without danger or expense, the adventurous piety of his
subjects, who sailed, in a gallant fleet, from the coast of Flanders to
the Hellespont. The maritime republics of Venice and Genoa were less
remote from the scene of action; and their hostile fleets were
associated under the standard of St. Peter. The kingdoms of Hungary and
Poland, which covered as it were the interior pale of the Latin church,
were the most nearly concerned to oppose the progress of the Turks. Arms
were the patrimony of the Scythians and Sarmatians; and these nations
might appear equal to the contest, could they point, against the common
foe, those swords that were so wantonly drawn in bloody and domestic
quarrels. But the same spirit was adverse to concord and obedience: a
poor country and a limited monarch are incapable of maintaining a
standing force; and the loose bodies of Polish and Hungarian horse were
not armed with the sentiments and weapons which, on some occasions, have
given irresistible weight to the French chivalry. Yet, on this side, the
designs of the Roman pontiff, and the eloquence of Cardinal Julian, his
legate, were promoted by the circumstances of the times: ^18 by the
union of the two crowns on the head of Ladislaus, ^19 a young and
ambitious soldier; by the valor of a hero, whose name, the name of John
Huniades, was already popular among the Christians, and formidable to
the Turks. An endless treasure of pardons and indulgences was scattered
by the legate; many private warriors of France and Germany enlisted
under the holy banner; and the crusade derived some strength, or at
least some reputation, from the new allies both of Europe and Asia. A
fugitive despot of Servia exaggerated the distress and ardor of the
Christians beyond the Danube, who would unanimously rise to vindicate
their religion and liberty. The Greek emperor, ^20 with a spirit unknown
to his fathers, engaged to guard the Bosphorus, and to sally from
Constantinople at the head of his national and mercenary troops. The
sultan of Caramania ^21 announced the retreat of Amurath, and a powerful
diversion in the heart of Anatolia; and if the fleets of the West could
occupy at the same moment the Straits of the Hellespont, the Ottoman
monarchy would be dissevered and destroyed. Heaven and earth must
rejoice in the perdition of the miscreants; and the legate, with prudent
ambiguity, instilled the opinion of the invisible, perhaps the visible,
aid of the Son of God, and his divine mother.

[Footnote 16: In the year 1431, Germany raised 40,000 horse,
men-at-arms, against the Hussites of Bohemia, (Lenfant, Hist. du Concile
de Basle, tom. i. p. 318.) At the siege of Nuys, on the Rhine, in 1474,
the princes, prelates, and cities, sent their respective quotas; and the
bishop of Munster (qui n'est pas des plus grands) furnished 1400 horse,
6000 foot, all in green, with 1200 wagons. The united armies of the king
of England and the duke of Burgundy scarcely equalled one third of this
German host, (Mémoires de Philippe de Comines, l. iv. c. 2.) At present,
six or seven hundred thousand men are maintained in constant pay and
admirable discipline by the powers of Germany.]

[Footnote 17: It was not till the year 1444, that France and England
could agree on a truce of some months. (See Rymer's Fdera, and the
chronicles of both nations.)]

[Footnote 18: In the Hungarian crusade, Spondanus (Annal. Ecclés. A.D.
1443, 1444) has been my leading guide. He has diligently read, and
critically compared, the Greek and Turkish materials, the historians of
Hungary, Poland, and the West. His narrative is perspicuous and where he
can be free from a religious bias, the judgment of Spondanus is not
contemptible.]

[Footnote 19: I have curtailed the harsh letter (Wladislaus) which most
writers affix to his name, either in compliance with the Polish
pronunciation, or to distinguish him from his rival the infant Ladislaus
of Austria. Their competition for the crown of Hungary is described by
Callimachus, (l. i. ii. p. 447--486,) Bonfinius, (Decad. iii. l. iv.,)
Spondanus, and Lenfant.]

[Footnote 20: The Greek historians, Phranza, Chalcondyles, and Ducas, do
not ascribe to their prince a very active part in this crusade, which he
seems to have promoted by his wishes, and injured by his fears.]

[Footnote 21: Cantemir (p. 88) ascribes to his policy the original plan,
and transcribes his animating epistle to the king of Hungary. But the
Mahometan powers are seldom it formed of the state of Christendom and
the situation and correspondence of the knights of Rhodes must connect
them with the sultan of Caramania.]

Of the Polish and Hungarian diets, a religious war was the unanimous
cry; and Ladislaus, after passing the Danube, led an army of his
confederate subjects as far as Sophia, the capital of the Bulgarian
kingdom. In this expedition they obtained two signal victories, which
were justly ascribed to the valor and conduct of Huniades. In the first,
with a vanguard of ten thousand men, he surprised the Turkish camp; in
the second, he vanquished and made prisoner the most renowned of their
generals, who possessed the double advantage of ground and numbers. The
approach of winter, and the natural and artificial obstacles of Mount
Hæmus, arrested the progress of the hero, who measured a narrow interval
of six days' march from the foot of the mountains to the hostile towers
of Adrianople, and the friendly capital of the Greek empire. The retreat
was undisturbed; and the entrance into Buda was at once a military and
religious triumph. An ecclesiastical procession was followed by the king
and his warriors on foot: he nicely balanced the merits and rewards of
the two nations; and the pride of conquest was blended with the humble
temper of Christianity. Thirteen bashaws, nine standards, and four
thousand captives, were unquestionable trophies; and as all were willing
to believe, and none were present to contradict, the crusaders
multiplied, with unblushing confidence, the myriads of Turks whom they
had left on the field of battle. ^22 The most solid proof, and the most
salutary consequence, of victory, was a deputation from the divan to
solicit peace, to restore Servia, to ransom the prisoners, and to
evacuate the Hungarian frontier. By this treaty, the rational objects of
the war were obtained: the king, the despot, and Huniades himself, in
the diet of Segedin, were satisfied with public and private emolument; a
truce of ten years was concluded; and the followers of Jesus and
Mahomet, who swore on the Gospel and the Koran, attested the word of God
as the guardian of truth and the avenger of perfidy. In the place of the
Gospel, the Turkish ministers had proposed to substitute the Eucharist,
the real presence of the Catholic deity; but the Christians refused to
profane their holy mysteries; and a superstitious conscience is less
forcibly bound by the spiritual energy, than by the outward and visible
symbols of an oath. ^23

[Footnote 22: In their letters to the emperor Frederic III. the
Hungarians slay 80,000 Turks in one battle; but the modest Julian
reduces the slaughter to 6000 or even 2000 infidels, (Æneas Sylvius in
Europ. c. 5, and epist. 44, 81, apud Spondanum.)]

[Footnote 23: See the origin of the Turkish war, and the first
expedition of Ladislaus, in the vth and vith books of the iiid decad of
Bonfinius, who, in his division and style, copies Livy with tolerable
success Callimachus (l. ii p. 487--496) is still more pure and
authentic.]

During the whole transaction, the cardinal legate had observed a sullen
silence, unwilling to approve, and unable to oppose, the consent of the
king and people. But the diet was not dissolved before Julian was
fortified by the welcome intelligence, that Anatolia was invaded by the
Caramanian, and Thrace by the Greek emperor; that the fleets of Genoa,
Venice, and Burgundy, were masters of the Hellespont; and that the
allies, informed of the victory, and ignorant of the treaty, of
Ladislaus, impatiently waited for the return of his victorious army.
"And is it thus," exclaimed the cardinal, ^24 "that you will desert
their expectations and your own fortune? It is to them, to your God, and
your fellow-Christians, that you have pledged your faith; and that prior
obligation annihilates a rash and sacrilegious oath to the enemies of
Christ. His vicar on earth is the Roman pontiff; without whose sanction
you can neither promise nor perform. In his name I absolve your perjury
and sanctify your arms: follow my footsteps in the paths of glory and
salvation; and if still ye have scruples, devolve on my head the
punishment and the sin." This mischievous casuistry was seconded by his
respectable character, and the levity of popular assemblies: war was
resolved, on the same spot where peace had so lately been sworn; and, in
the execution of the treaty, the Turks were assaulted by the Christians;
to whom, with some reason, they might apply the epithet of Infidels. The
falsehood of Ladislaus to his word and oath was palliated by the
religion of the times: the most perfect, or at least the most popular,
excuse would have been the success of his arms and the deliverance of
the Eastern church. But the same treaty which should have bound his
conscience had diminished his strength. On the proclamation of the
peace, the French and German volunteers departed with indignant murmurs:
the Poles were exhausted by distant warfare, and perhaps disgusted with
foreign command; and their palatines accepted the first license, and
hastily retired to their provinces and castles. Even Hungary was divided
by faction, or restrained by a laudable scruple; and the relics of the
crusade that marched in the second expedition were reduced to an
inadequate force of twenty thousand men. A Walachian chief, who joined
the royal standard with his vassals, presumed to remark that their
numbers did not exceed the hunting retinue that sometimes attended the
sultan; and the gift of two horses of matchless speed might admonish
Ladislaus of his secret foresight of the event. But the despot of
Servia, after the restoration of his country and children, was tempted
by the promise of new realms; and the inexperience of the king, the
enthusiasm of the legate, and the martial presumption of Huniades
himself, were persuaded that every obstacle must yield to the invincible
virtue of the sword and the cross. After the passage of the Danube, two
roads might lead to Constantinople and the Hellespont: the one direct,
abrupt, and difficult through the mountains of Hæmus; the other more
tedious and secure, over a level country, and along the shores of the
Euxine; in which their flanks, according to the Scythian discipline,
might always be covered by a movable fortification of wagons. The latter
was judiciously preferred: the Catholics marched through the plains of
Bulgaria, burning, with wanton cruelty, the churches and villages of the
Christian natives; and their last station was at Warna, near the
sea-shore; on which the defeat and death of Ladislaus have bestowed a
memorable name. ^25

[Footnote 24: I do not pretend to warrant the literal accuracy of
Julian's speech, which is variously worded by Callimachus, (l. iii. p.
505--507,) Bonfinius, (dec. iii. l. vi. p. 457, 458,) and other
historians, who might indulge their own eloquence, while they represent
one of the orators of the age. But they all agree in the advice and
arguments for perjury, which in the field of controversy are fiercely
attacked by the Protestants, and feebly defended by the Catholics. The
latter are discouraged by the misfortune of Warna.]

[Footnote 25: Warna, under the Grecian name of Odessus, was a colony of
the Milesians, which they denominated from the hero Ulysses, (Cellarius,
tom. i. p. 374. D'Anville, tom. i. p. 312.) According to Arrian's
Periplus of the Euxine, (p. 24, 25, in the first volume of Hudson's
Geographers,) it was situate 1740 stadia, or furlongs, from the mouth of
the Danube, 2140 from Byzantium, and 360 to the north of a ridge of
promontory of Mount Hæmus, which advances into the sea.]

Chapter LXVII: Schism Of The Greeks And Latins. -- Part II.

It was on this fatal spot, that, instead of finding a confederate fleet
to second their operations, they were alarmed by the approach of Amurath
himself, who had issued from his Magnesian solitude, and transported the
forces of Asia to the defence of Europe. According to some writers, the
Greek emperor had been awed, or seduced, to grant the passage of the
Bosphorus; and an indelible stain of corruption is fixed on the Genoese,
or the pope's nephew, the Catholic admiral, whose mercenary connivance
betrayed the guard of the Hellespont. From Adrianople, the sultan
advanced by hasty marches, at the head of sixty thousand men; and when
the cardinal, and Huniades, had taken a nearer survey of the numbers and
order of the Turks, these ardent warriors proposed the tardy and
impracticable measure of a retreat. The king alone was resolved to
conquer or die; and his resolution had almost been crowned with a
glorious and salutary victory. The princes were opposite to each other
in the centre; and the Beglerbegs, or generals of Anatolia and Romania,
commanded on the right and left, against the adverse divisions of the
despot and Huniades. The Turkish wings were broken on the first onset:
but the advantage was fatal; and the rash victors, in the heat of the
pursuit, were carried away far from the annoyance of the enemy, or the
support of their friends. When Amurath beheld the flight of his
squadrons, he despaired of his fortune and that of the empire: a veteran
Janizary seized his horse's bridle; and he had magnanimity to pardon and
reward the soldier who dared to perceive the terror, and arrest the
flight, of his sovereign. A copy of the treaty, the monument of
Christian perfidy, had been displayed in the front of battle; and it is
said, that the sultan in his distress, lifting his eyes and his hands to
heaven, implored the protection of the God of truth; and called on the
prophet Jesus himself to avenge the impious mockery of his name and
religion. ^26 With inferior numbers and disordered ranks, the king of
Hungary rushed forward in the confidence of victory, till his career was
stopped by the impenetrable phalanx of the Janizaries. If we may credit
the Ottoman annals, his horse was pierced by the javelin of Amurath; ^27
he fell among the spears of the infantry; and a Turkish soldier
proclaimed with a loud voice, "Hungarians, behold the head of your
king!" The death of Ladislaus was the signal of their defeat. On his
return from an intemperate pursuit, Huniades deplored his error, and the
public loss; he strove to rescue the royal body, till he was overwhelmed
by the tumultuous crowd of the victors and vanquished; and the last
efforts of his courage and conduct were exerted to save the remnant of
his Walachian cavalry. Ten thousand Christians were slain in the
disastrous battle of Warna: the loss of the Turks, more considerable in
numbers, bore a smaller proportion to their total strength; yet the
philosophic sultan was not ashamed to confess, that his ruin must be the
consequence of a second and similar victory. ^* At his command a column
was erected on the spot where Ladislaus had fallen; but the modest
inscription, instead of accusing the rashness, recorded the valor, and
bewailed the misfortune, of the Hungarian youth. ^28

[Footnote 26: Some Christian writers affirm, that he drew from his bosom
the host or wafer on which the treaty had notbeen sworn. The Moslems
suppose, with more simplicity, an appeal to God and his prophet Jesus,
which is likewise insinuated by Callimachus, (l. iii. p. 516. Spondan.
A.D. 1444, No. 8.)]

[Footnote 27: A critic will always distrust these spolia opimaof a
victorious general, so difficult for valor to obtain, so easy for
flattery to invent, (Cantemir, p. 90, 91.) Callimachus (l. iii. p. 517)
more simply and probably affirms, supervenitibus Janizaris, telorum
multitudine, non jam confossus est, quam obrutus.]

[Footnote *: Compare Von Hammer, p. 463. -- M.]

[Footnote 28: Besides some valuable hints from Æneas Sylvius, which are
diligently collected by Spondanus, our best authorities are three
historians of the xvth century, Philippus Callimachus, (de Rebus a
Vladislao Polonorum atque Hungarorum Rege gestis, libri iii. in Bel.
Script. Rerum Hungaricarum, tom. i. p. 433--518,) Bonfinius, (decad.
iii. l. v. p. 460--467,) and Chalcondyles, (l. vii. p. 165--179.) The
two first were Italians, but they passed their lives in Poland and
Hungary, (Fabric. Bibliot. Latin. Med. et InfimæÆtatis, tom. i. p. 324.
Vossius, de Hist. Latin. l. iii. c. 8, 11. Bayle, Dictionnaire,
Bonfinius.) A small tract of Fælix Petancius, chancellor of Segnia, (ad
calcem Cuspinian. de Cæsaribus, p. 716--722,) represents the theatre of
the war in the xvth century.]

Before I lose sight of the field of Warna, I am tempted to pause on the
character and story of two principal actors, the cardinal Julian and
John Huniades. Julian ^29 Cæsarini was born of a noble family of Rome:
his studies had embraced both the Latin and Greek learning, both the
sciences of divinity and law; and his versatile genius was equally
adapted to the schools, the camp, and the court. No sooner had he been
invested with the Roman purple, than he was sent into Germany to arm the
empire against the rebels and heretics of Bohemia. The spirit of
persecution is unworthy of a Christian; the military profession ill
becomes a priest; but the former is excused by the times; and the latter
was ennobled by the courage of Julian, who stood dauntless and alone in
the disgraceful flight of the German host. As the pope's legate, he
opened the council of Basil; but the president soon appeared the most
strenuous champion of ecclesiastical freedom; and an opposition of seven
years was conducted by his ability and zeal. After promoting the
strongest measures against the authority and person of Eugenius, some
secret motive of interest or conscience engaged him to desert on a
sudden the popular party. The cardinal withdrew himself from Basil to
Ferrara; and, in the debates of the Greeks and Latins, the two nations
admired the dexterity of his arguments and the depth of his theological
erudition. ^30 In his Hungarian embassy, we have already seen the
mischievous effects of his sophistry and eloquence, of which Julian
himself was the first victim. The cardinal, who performed the duties of
a priest and a soldier, was lost in the defeat of Warna. The
circumstances of his death are variously related; but it is believed,
that a weighty encumbrance of gold impeded his flight, and tempted the
cruel avarice of some Christian fugitives.

[Footnote 29: M. Lenfant has described the origin (Hist. du Concile de
Basle, tom. i. p. 247, &c.) and Bohemian campaign (p. 315, &c.) of
Cardinal Julian. His services at Basil and Ferrara, and his unfortunate
end, are occasionally related by Spondanus, and the continuator of
Fleury.]

[Footnote 30: Syropulus honorably praises the talent of an enemy, (p.
117:) toiauta tina eipen o IoulianoV peplatusmenwV agan kai logikwV, kai
met episthmhV kai deinothtoV 'RhtprikhV.]

From an humble, or at least a doubtful origin, the merit of John
Huniades promoted him to the command of the Hungarian armies. His father
was a Walachian, his mother a Greek: her unknown race might possibly
ascend to the emperors of Constantinople; and the claims of the
Walachians, with the surname of Corvinus, from the place of his
nativity, might suggest a thin pretence for mingling his blood with the
patricians of ancient Rome. ^31 In his youth he served in the wars of
Italy, and was retained, with twelve horsemen, by the bishop of Zagrab:
the valor of the white knight^32 was soon conspicuous; he increased his
fortunes by a noble and wealthy marriage; and in the defence of the
Hungarian borders he won in the same year three battles against the
Turks. By his influence, Ladislaus of Poland obtained the crown of
Hungary; and the important service was rewarded by the title and office
of Waivod of Transylvania. The first of Julian's crusades added two
Turkish laurels on his brow; and in the public distress the fatal errors
of Warna were forgotten. During the absence and minority of Ladislaus of
Austria, the titular king, Huniades was elected supreme captain and
governor of Hungary; and if envy at first was silenced by terror, a
reign of twelve years supposes the arts of policy as well as of war. Yet
the idea of a consummate general is not delineated in his campaigns; the
white knight fought with the hand rather than the head, as the chief of
desultory Barbarians, who attack without fear and fly without shame; and
his military life is composed of a romantic alternative of victories and
escapes. By the Turks, who employed his name to frighten their perverse
children, he was corruptly denominated Jancus Lain, or the Wicked: their
hatred is the proof of their esteem; the kingdom which he guarded was
inaccessible to their arms; and they felt him most daring and
formidable, when they fondly believed the captain and his country
irrecoverably lost. Instead of confining himself to a defensive war,
four years after the defeat of Warna he again penetrated into the heart
of Bulgaria, and in the plain of Cossova, sustained, till the third day,
the shock of the Ottoman army, four times more numerous than his own. As
he fled alone through the woods of Walachia, the hero was surprised by
two robbers; but while they disputed a gold chain that hung at his neck,
he recovered his sword, slew the one, terrified the other, and, after
new perils of captivity or death, consoled by his presence an afflicted
kingdom. But the last and most glorious action of his life was the
defence of Belgrade against the powers of Mahomet the Second in person.
After a siege of forty days, the Turks, who had already entered the
town, were compelled to retreat; and the joyful nations celebrated
Huniades and Belgrade as the bulwarks of Christendom. ^33 About a month
after this great deliverance, the champion expired; and his most
splendid epitaph is the regret of the Ottoman prince, who sighed that he
could no longer hope for revenge against the single antagonist who had
triumphed over his arms. On the first vacancy of the throne, Matthias
Corvinus, a youth of eighteen years of age, was elected and crowned by
the grateful Hungarians. His reign was prosperous and long: Matthias
aspired to the glory of a conqueror and a saint: but his purest merit is
the encouragement of learning; and the Latin orators and historians, who
were invited from Italy by the son, have shed the lustre of their
eloquence on the father's character. ^34

[Footnote 31: See Bonfinius, decad. iii. l. iv. p. 423. Could the
Italian historian pronounce, or the king of Hungary hear, without a
blush, the absurd flattery which confounded the name of a Walachian
village with the casual, though glorious, epithet of a single branch of
the Valerian family at Rome?]

[Footnote 32: Philip de Comines, (Mémoires, l. vi. c. 13,) from the
tradition of the times, mentions him with high encomiums, but under the
whimsical name of the Chevalier Blanc de Valaigne, (Valachia.) The Greek
Chalcondyles, and the Turkish annals of Leunclavius, presume to accuse
his fidelity or valor.]

[Footnote 33: See Bonfinius (decad. iii. l. viii. p. 492) and Spondanus,
(A.D. 456, No. 1--7.) Huniades shared the glory of the defence of
Belgrade with Capistran, a Franciscan friar; and in their respective
narratives, neither the saint nor the hero condescend to take notice of
his rival's merit.]

[Footnote 34: See Bonfinius, decad. iii. l. viii. -- decad. iv. l. viii.
The observations of Spondanus on the life and character of Matthias
Corvinus are curious and critical, (A.D. 1464, No. 1, 1475, No. 6, 1476,
No. 14--16, 1490, No. 4, 5.) Italian fame was the object of his vanity.
His actions are celebrated in the Epitome Rerum Hungaricarum (p.
322--412) of Peter Ranzanus, a Sicilian. His wise and facetious sayings
are registered by Galestus Martius of Narni, (528--568,) and we have a
particular narrative of his wedding and coronation. These three tracts
are all contained in the first vol. of Bel's Scriptores Rerum
Hungaricarum.]

In the list of heroes, John Huniades and Scanderbeg are commonly
associated; ^35 and they are both entitled to our notice, since their
occupation of the Ottoman arms delayed the ruin of the Greek empire.
John Castriot, the father of Scanderbeg, ^36 was the hereditary prince
of a small district of Epirus or Albania, between the mountains and the
Adriatic Sea. Unable to contend with the sultan's power, Castriot
submitted to the hard conditions of peace and tribute: he delivered his
four sons as the pledges of his fidelity; and the Christian youths,
after receiving the mark of circumcision, were instructed in the
Mahometan religion, and trained in the arms and arts of Turkish policy.
^37 The three elder brothers were confounded in the crowd of slaves; and
the poison to which their deaths are ascribed cannot be verified or
disproved by any positive evidence. Yet the suspicion is in a great
measure removed by the kind and paternal treatment of George Castriot,
the fourth brother, who, from his tender youth, displayed the strength
and spirit of a soldier. The successive overthrow of a Tartar and two
Persians, who carried a proud defiance to the Turkish court, recommended
him to the favor of Amurath, and his Turkish appellation of Scanderbeg,
(Iskender beg,) or the lord Alexander, is an indelible memorial of his
glory and servitude. His father's principality was reduced into a
province; but the loss was compensated by the rank and title of Sanjiak,
a command of five thousand horse, and the prospect of the first
dignities of the empire. He served with honor in the wars of Europe and
Asia; and we may smile at the art or credulity of the historian, who
supposes, that in every encounter he spared the Christians, while he
fell with a thundering arm on his Mussulman foes. The glory of Huniades
is without reproach: he fought in the defence of his religion and
country; but the enemies who applaud the patriot, have branded his rival
with the name of traitor and apostate. In the eyes of the Christian, the
rebellion of Scanderbeg is justified by his father's wrongs, the
ambiguous death of his three brothers, his own degradation, and the
slavery of his country; and they adore the generous, though tardy, zeal,
with which he asserted the faith and independence of his ancestors. But
he had imbibed from his ninth year the doctrines of the Koran; he was
ignorant of the Gospel; the religion of a soldier is determined by
authority and habit; nor is it easy to conceive what new illumination at
the age of forty ^38 could be poured into his soul. His motives would be
less exposed to the suspicion of interest or revenge, had he broken his
chain from the moment that he was sensible of its weight: but a long
oblivion had surely impaired his original right; and every year of
obedience and reward had cemented the mutual bond of the sultan and his
subject. If Scanderbeg had long harbored the belief of Christianity and
the intention of revolt, a worthy mind must condemn the base
dissimulation, that could serve only to betray, that could promise only
to be forsworn, that could actively join in the temporal and spiritual
perdition of so many thousands of his unhappy brethren. Shall we praise
a secret correspondence with Huniades, while he commanded the vanguard
of the Turkish army? shall we excuse the desertion of his standard, a
treacherous desertion which abandoned the victory to the enemies of his
benefactor? In the confusion of a defeat, the eye of Scanderbeg was
fixed on the Reis Effendi or principal secretary: with the dagger at his
breast, he extorted a firman or patent for the government of Albania;
and the murder of the guiltless scribe and his train prevented the
consequences of an immediate discovery. With some bold companions, to
whom he had revealed his design he escaped in the night, by rapid
marches, from the field or battle to his paternal mountains. The gates
of Croya were opened to the royal mandate; and no sooner did he command
the fortress, than George Castriot dropped the mask of dissimulation;
abjured the prophet and the sultan, and proclaimed himself the avenger
of his family and country. The names of religion and liberty provoked a
general revolt: the Albanians, a martial race, were unanimous to live
and die with their hereditary prince; and the Ottoman garrisons were
indulged in the choice of martyrdom or baptism. In the assembly of the
states of Epirus, Scanderbeg was elected general of the Turkish war; and
each of the allies engaged to furnish his respective proportion of men
and money. From these contributions, from his patrimonial estate, and
from the valuable salt-pits of Selina, he drew an annual revenue of two
hundred thousand ducats; ^39 and the entire sum, exempt from the demands
of luxury, was strictly appropriated to the public use. His manners were
popular; but his discipline was severe; and every superfluous vice was
banished from his camp: his example strengthened his command; and under
his conduct, the Albanians were invincible in their own opinion and that
of their enemies. The bravest adventurers of France and Germany were
allured by his fame and retained in his service: his standing militia
consisted of eight thousand horse and seven thousand foot; the horses
were small, the men were active; but he viewed with a discerning eye the
difficulties and resources of the mountains; and, at the blaze of the
beacons, the whole nation was distributed in the strongest posts. With
such unequal arms Scanderbeg resisted twenty-three years the powers of
the Ottoman empire; and two conquerors, Amurath the Second, and his
greater son, were repeatedly baffled by a rebel, whom they pursued with
seeming contempt and implacable resentment. At the head of sixty
thousand horse and forty thousand Janizaries, Amurath entered Albania:
he might ravage the open country, occupy the defenceless towns, convert
the churches into mosques, circumcise the Christian youths, and punish
with death his adult and obstinate captives: but the conquests of the
sultan were confined to the petty fortress of Sfetigrade; and the
garrison, invincible to his arms, was oppressed by a paltry artifice and
a superstitious scruple. ^40 Amurath retired with shame and loss from
the walls of Croya, the castle and residence of the Castriots; the
march, the siege, the retreat, were harassed by a vexatious, and almost
invisible, adversary; ^41 and the disappointment might tend to imbitter,
perhaps to shorten, the last days of the sultan. ^42 In the fulness of
conquest, Mahomet the Second still felt at his bosom this domestic
thorn: his lieutenants were permitted to negotiate a truce; and the
Albanian prince may justly be praised as a firm and able champion of his
national independence. The enthusiasm of chivalry and religion has
ranked him with the names of Alexander and Pyrrhus; nor would they blush
to acknowledge their intrepid countryman: but his narrow dominion, and
slender powers, must leave him at an humble distance below the heroes of
antiquity, who triumphed over the East and the Roman legions. His
splendid achievements, the bashaws whom he encountered, the armies that
he discomfited, and the three thousand Turks who were slain by his
single hand, must be weighed in the scales of suspicious criticism.
Against an illiterate enemy, and in the dark solitude of Epirus, his
partial biographers may safely indulge the latitude of romance: but
their fictions are exposed by the light of Italian history; and they
afford a strong presumption against their own truth, by a fabulous tale
of his exploits, when he passed the Adriatic with eight hundred horse to
the succor of the king of Naples. ^43 Without disparagement to his fame,
they might have owned, that he was finally oppressed by the Ottoman
powers: in his extreme danger he applied to Pope Pius the Second for a
refuge in the ecclesiastical state; and his resources were almost
exhausted, since Scanderbeg died a fugitive at Lissus, on the Venetian
territory. ^44 His sepulchre was soon violated by the Turkish
conquerors; but the Janizaries, who wore his bones enchased in a
bracelet, declared by this superstitious amulet their involuntary
reverence for his valor. The instant ruin of his country may redound to
the hero's glory; yet, had he balanced the consequences of submission
and resistance, a patriot perhaps would have declined the unequal
contest which must depend on the life and genius of one man. Scanderbeg
might indeed be supported by the rational, though fallacious, hope, that
the pope, the king of Naples, and the Venetian republic, would join in
the defence of a free and Christian people, who guarded the sea-coast of
the Adriatic, and the narrow passage from Greece to Italy. His infant
son was saved from the national shipwreck; the Castriots ^45 were
invested with a Neapolitan dukedom, and their blood continues to flow in
the noblest families of the realm. A colony of Albanian fugitives
obtained a settlement in Calabria, and they preserve at this day the
language and manners of their ancestors. ^46

[Footnote 35: They are ranked by Sir William Temple, in his pleasing
Essay on Heroic Virtue, (Works, vol. iii. p. 385,) among the seven
chiefs who have deserved without wearing, a royal crown; Belisarius,
Narses, Gonsalvo of Cordova, William first prince of Orange, Alexander
duke of Parma, John Huniades, and George Castriot, or Scanderbeg.]

[Footnote 36: I could wish for some simple authentic memoirs of a friend
of Scanderbeg, which would introduce me to the man, the time, and the
place. In the old and national history of Marinus Barletius, a priest of
Scodra, (de Vita. Moribus, et Rebus gestis Georgii Castrioti, &c. libri
xiii. p. 367. Argentorat. 1537, in fol.,) his gaudy and cumbersome robes
are stuck with many false jewels. See likewise Chalcondyles, l vii. p.
185, l. viii. p. 229.]

[Footnote 37: His circumcision, education, &c., are marked by Marinus
with brevity and reluctance, (l. i. p. 6, 7.)]

[Footnote 38: Since Scanderbeg died A.D. 1466, in the lxiiid year of his
age, (Marinus, l. xiii. p. 370,) he was born in 1403; since he was torn
from his parents by the Turks, when he was novennis, (Marinus, l. i. p.
1, 6,) that event must have happened in 1412, nine years before the
accession of Amurath II., who must have inherited, not acquired the
Albanian slave. Spondanus has remarked this inconsistency, A.D. 1431,
No. 31, 1443, No. 14.]

[Footnote 39: His revenue and forces are luckily given by Marinus, (l.
ii. p. 44.)]

[Footnote 40: There were two Dibras, the upper aud lower, the Bulgarian
and Albanian: the former, 70 miles from Croya, (l. i. p. 17,) was
contiguous to the fortress of Sfetigrade, whose inhabitants refused to
drink from a well into which a dead dog had traitorously been cast, (l.
v. p. 139, 140.) We want a good map of Epirus.]

[Footnote 41: Compare the Turkish narrative of Cantemir (p. 92) with the
pompous and prolix declamation in the ivth, vth, and vith books of the
Albanian priest, who has been copied by the tribe of strangers and
moderns.]

[Footnote 42: In honor of his hero, Barletius (l. vi. p. 188--192) kills
the sultan by disease indeed, under the walls of Croya. But this
audacious fiction is disproved by the Greeks and Turks, who agree in the
time and manner of Amurath's death at Adrianople.]

[Footnote 43: See the marvels of his Calabrian expedition in the ixth
and xth books of Marinus Barletius, which may be rectified by the
testimony or silence of Muratori, (Annali d'Italia, tom. xiii. p. 291,)
and his original authors, (Joh. Simonetta de Rebus Francisci Sfortiæ, in
Muratori, Script. Rerum Ital. tom. xxi. p. 728, et alios.) The Albanian
cavalry, under the name of Stradiots, soon became famous in the wars of
Italy, (Mémoires de Comines, l. viii. c. 5.)]

[Footnote 44: Spondanus, from the best evidence, and the most rational
criticism, has reduced the giant Scanderbeg to the human size, (A.D.
1461, No. 20, 1463, No. 9, 1465, No. 12, 13, 1467, No. 1.) His own
letter to the pope, and the testimony of Phranza, (l. iii. c. 28,) a
refugee in the neighboring isle of Corfu, demonstrate his last distress,
which is awkwardly concealed by Marinus Barletius, (l. x.)]

[Footnote 45: See the family of the Castriots, in Ducange, (Fam.
Dalmaticæ, &c, xviii. p. 348--350.)]

[Footnote 46: This colony of Albanese is mentioned by Mr. Swinburne,
(Travels into the Two Sicilies, vol. i. p. 350--354.)]

In the long career of the decline and fall of the Roman empire, I have
reached at length the last reign of the princes of Constantinople, who
so feebly sustained the name and majesty of the Cæsars. On the decease
of John Palæologus, who survived about four years the Hungarian crusade,
^47 the royal family, by the death of Andronicus and the monastic
profession of Isidore, was reduced to three princes, Constantine,
Demetrius, and Thomas, the surviving sons of the emperor Manuel. Of
these the first and the last were far distant in the Morea; but
Demetrius, who possessed the domain of Selybria, was in the suburbs, at
the head of a party: his ambition was not chilled by the public
distress; and his conspiracy with the Turks and the schismatics had
already disturbed the peace of his country. The funeral of the late
emperor was accelerated with singular and even suspicious haste: the
claim of Demetrius to the vacant throne was justified by a trite and
flimsy sophism, that he was born in the purple, the eldest son of his
father's reign. But the empress-mother, the senate and soldiers, the
clergy and people, were unanimous in the cause of the lawful successor:
and the despot Thomas, who, ignorant of the change, accidentally
returned to the capital, asserted with becoming zeal the interest of his
absent brother. An ambassador, the historian Phranza, was immediately
despatched to the court of Adrianople. Amurath received him with honor
and dismissed him with gifts; but the gracious approbation of the
Turkish sultan announced his supremacy, and the approaching downfall of
the Eastern empire. By the hands of two illustrious deputies, the
Imperial crown was placed at Sparta on the head of Constantine. In the
spring he sailed from the Morea, escaped the encounter of a Turkish
squadron, enjoyed the acclamations of his subjects, celebrated the
festival of a new reign, and exhausted by his donatives the treasure, or
rather the indigence, of the state. The emperor immediately resigned to
his brothers the possession of the Morea; and the brittle friendship of
the two princes, Demetrius and Thomas, was confirmed in their mother's
presence by the frail security of oaths and embraces. His next
occupation was the choice of a consort. A daughter of the doge of Venice
had been proposed; but the Byzantine nobles objected the distance
between an hereditary monarch and an elective magistrate; and in their
subsequent distress, the chief of that powerful republic was not
unmindful of the affront. Constantine afterwards hesitated between the
royal families of Trebizond and Georgia; and the embassy of Phranza
represents in his public and private life the last days of the Byzantine
empire. ^48

[Footnote 47: The Chronology of Phranza is clear and authentic; but
instead of four years and seven months, Spondanus (A.D. 1445, No. 7,)
assigns seven or eight years to the reign of the last Constantine which
he deduces from a spurious epistle of Eugenius IV. to the king of
Æthiopia.]

[Footnote 48: Phranza (l. iii. c. 1--6) deserves credit and esteem.]

The protovestiare, or great chamberlain, Phranza sailed from
Constantinople as the minister of a bridegroom; and the relics of wealth
and luxury were applied to his pompous appearance. His numerous retinue
consisted of nobles and guards, of physicians and monks: he was attended
by a band of music; and the term of his costly embassy was protracted
above two years. On his arrival in Georgia or Iberia, the natives from
the towns and villages flocked around the strangers; and such was their
simplicity, that they were delighted with the effects, without
understanding the cause, of musical harmony. Among the crowd was an old
man, above a hundred years of age, who had formerly been carried away a
captive by the Barbarians, ^49 and who amused his hearers with a tale of
the wonders of India, ^50 from whence he had returned to Portugal by an
unknown sea. ^51 From this hospitable land, Phranza proceeded to the
court of Trebizond, where he was informed by the Greek prince of the
recent decease of Amurath. Instead of rejoicing in the deliverance, the
experienced statesman expressed his apprehension, that an ambitious
youth would not long adhere to the sage and pacific system of his
father. After the sultan's decease, his Christian wife, Maria, ^52 the
daughter of the Servian despot, had been honorably restored to her
parents; on the fame of her beauty and merit, she was recommended by the
ambassador as the most worthy object of the royal choice; and Phranza
recapitulates and refutes the specious objections that might be raised
against the proposal. The majesty of the purple would ennoble an unequal
alliance; the bar of affinity might be removed by liberal alms and the
dispensation of the church; the disgrace of Turkish nuptials had been
repeatedly overlooked; and, though the fair Maria was nearly fifty years
of age, she might yet hope to give an heir to the empire. Constantine
listened to the advice, which was transmitted in the first ship that
sailed from Trebizond; but the factions of the court opposed his
marriage; and it was finally prevented by the pious vow of the sultana,
who ended her days in the monastic profession. Reduced to the first
alternative, the choice of Phranza was decided in favor of a Georgian
princess; and the vanity of her father was dazzled by the glorious
alliance. Instead of demanding, according to the primitive and national
custom, a price for his daughter, ^53 he offered a portion of fifty-six
thousand, with an annual pension of five thousand, ducats; and the
services of the ambassador were repaid by an assurance, that, as his son
had been adopted in baptism by the emperor, the establishment of his
daughter should be the peculiar care of the empress of Constantinople.
On the return of Phranza, the treaty was ratified by the Greek monarch,
who with his own hand impressed three vermilion crosses on the golden
bull, and assured the Georgian envoy that in the spring his galleys
should conduct the bride to her Imperial palace. But Constantine
embraced his faithful servant, not with the cold approbation of a
sovereign, but with the warm confidence of a friend, who, after a long
absence, is impatient to pour his secrets into the bosom of his friend.
"Since the death of my mother and of Cantacuzene, who alone advised me
without interest or passion, ^54 I am surrounded," said the emperor, "by
men whom I can neither love nor trust, nor esteem. You are not a
stranger to Lucas Notaras, the great admiral; obstinately attached to
his own sentiments, he declares, both in private and public, that his
sentiments are the absolute measure of my thoughts and actions. The rest
of the courtiers are swayed by their personal or factious views; and how
can I consult the monks on questions of policy and marriage? I have yet
much employment for your diligence and fidelity. In the spring you shall
engage one of my brothers to solicit the succor of the Western powers;
from the Morea you shall sail to Cyprus on a particular commission; and
from thence proceed to Georgia to receive and conduct the future
empress." -- "Your commands," replied Phranza, "are irresistible; but
deign, great sir," he added, with a serious smile, "to consider, that if
I am thus perpetually absent from my family, my wife may be tempted
either to seek another husband, or to throw herself into a monastery."
After laughing at his apprehensions, the emperor more gravely consoled
him by the pleasing assurance that thisshould be his last service
abroad, and that he destined for his son a wealthy and noble heiress;
for himself, the important office of great logothete, or principal
minister of state. The marriage was immediately stipulated: but the
office, however incompatible with his own, had been usurped by the
ambition of the admiral. Some delay was requisite to negotiate a consent
and an equivalent; and the nomination of Phranza was half declared, and
half suppressed, lest it might be displeasing to an insolent and
powerful favorite. The winter was spent in the preparations of his
embassy; and Phranza had resolved, that the youth his son should embrace
this opportunity of foreign travel, and be left, on the appearance of
danger, with his maternal kindred of the Morea. Such were the private
and public designs, which were interrupted by a Turkish war, and finally
buried in the ruins of the empire.

[Footnote 49: Suppose him to have been captured in 1394, in Timour's
first war in Georgia, (Sherefeddin, l. iii. c. 50;) he might follow his
Tartar master into Hindostan in 1398, and from thence sail to the spice
islands.]

[Footnote 50: The happy and pious Indians lived a hundred and fifty
years, and enjoyed the most perfect productions of the vegetable and
mineral kingdoms. The animals were on a large scale: dragons seventy
cubits, ants (the formica Indica) nine inches long, sheep like
elephants, elephants like sheep. Quidlibet audendi, &c.]

[Footnote 51: He sailed in a country vessel from the spice islands to
one of the ports of the exterior India; invenitque navem grandem
Ibericamquâin Portugalliamest delatus. This passage, composed in 1477,
(Phranza, l. iii. c. 30,) twenty years before the discovery of the Cape
of Good Hope, is spurious or wonderful. But this new geography is
sullied by the old and incompatible error which places the source of the
Nile in India.]

[Footnote 52: Cantemir, (p. 83,) who styles her the daughter of Lazarus
Ogli, and the Helen of the Servians, places her marriage with Amurath in
the year 1424. It will not easily be believed, that in six-and-twenty
years' cohabitation, the sultan corpus ejus non tetigit. After the
taking of Constantinople, she fled to Mahomet II., (Phranza, l. iii. c.
22.)]

[Footnote 53: The classical reader will recollect the offers of
Agamemnon, (Iliad, c. v. 144,) and the general practice of antiquity.]

[Footnote 54: Cantacuzene (I am ignorant of his relation to the emperor
of that name) was great domestic, a firm assertor of the Greek creed,
and a brother of the queen of Servia, whom he visited with the character
of ambassador, (Syropulus, p. 37, 38, 45.)]

Chapter LXVIII: Reign Of Mahomet The Second, Extinction Of Eastern
Empire.

Part I.

Reign And Character Of Mahomet The Second. -- Siege, Assault, And Final
Conquest, Of Constantinople By The Turks. -- Death Of Constantine
Palæologus. -- Servitude Of The Greeks. -- Extinction Of The Roman
Empire In The East. -- Consternation Of Europe. -- Conquests And Death
Of Mahomet The Second.

The siege of Constantinople by the Turks attracts our first attention to
the person and character of the great destroyer. Mahomet the Second ^1
was the son of the second Amurath; and though his mother has been
decorated with the titles of Christian and princess, she is more
probably confounded with the numerous concubines who peopled from every
climate the harem of the sultan. His first education and sentiments were
those of a devout Mussulman; and as often as he conversed with an
infidel, he purified his hands and face by the legal rites of ablution.
Age and empire appear to have relaxed this narrow bigotry: his aspiring
genius disdained to acknowledge a power above his own; and in his looser
hours he presumed (it is said) to brand the prophet of Mecca as a robber
and impostor. Yet the sultan persevered in a decent reverence for the
doctrine and discipline of the Koran: ^2 his private indiscretion must
have been sacred from the vulgar ear; and we should suspect the
credulity of strangers and sectaries, so prone to believe that a mind
which is hardened against truth must be armed with superior contempt for
absurdity and error. Under the tuition of the most skilful masters,
Mahomet advanced with an early and rapid progress in the paths of
knowledge; and besides his native tongue it is affirmed that he spoke or
understood five languages, ^3 the Arabic, the Persian, the Chaldæan or
Hebrew, the Latin, and the Greek. The Persian might indeed contribute to
his amusement, and the Arabic to his edification; and such studies are
familiar to the Oriental youth. In the intercourse of the Greeks and
Turks, a conqueror might wish to converse with the people over which he
was ambitious to reign: his own praises in Latin poetry ^4 or prose ^5
might find a passage to the royal ear; but what use or merit could
recommend to the statesman or the scholar the uncouth dialect of his
Hebrew slaves? The history and geography of the world were familiar to
his memory: the lives of the heroes of the East, perhaps of the West, ^6
excited his emulation: his skill in astrology is excused by the folly of
the times, and supposes some rudiments of mathematical science; and a
profane taste for the arts is betrayed in his liberal invitation and
reward of the painters of Italy. ^7 But the influence of religion and
learning were employed without effect on his savage and licentious
nature. I will not transcribe, nor do I firmly believe, the stories of
his fourteen pages, whose bellies were ripped open in search of a stolen
melon; or of the beauteous slave, whose head he severed from her body,
to convince the Janizaries that their master was not the votary of love.
^* His sobriety is attested by the silence of the Turkish annals, which
accuse three, and three only, of the Ottoman line of the vice of
drunkenness. ^8 But it cannot be denied that his passions were at once
furious and inexorable; that in the palace, as in the field, a torrent
of blood was spilt on the slightest provocation; and that the noblest of
the captive youth were often dishonored by his unnatural lust. In the
Albanian war he studied the lessons, and soon surpassed the example, of
his father; and the conquest of two empires, twelve kingdoms, and two
hundred cities, a vain and flattering account, is ascribed to his
invincible sword. He was doubtless a soldier, and possibly a general;
Constantinople has sealed his glory; but if we compare the means, the
obstacles, and the achievements, Mahomet the Second must blush to
sustain a parallel with Alexander or Timour. Under his command, the
Ottoman forces were always more numerous than their enemies; yet their
progress was bounded by the Euphrates and the Adriatic; and his arms
were checked by Huniades and Scanderbeg, by the Rhodian knights and by
the Persian king.

[Footnote 1: For the character of Mahomet II. it is dangerous to trust
either the Turks or the Christians. The most moderate picture appears to
be drawn by Phranza, (l. i. c. 33,) whose resentment had cooled in age
and solitude; see likewise Spondanus, (A.D. 1451, No. 11,) and the
continuator of Fleury, (tom. xxii. p. 552,) the Elogiaof Paulus Jovius,
(l. iii. p. 164--166,) and the Dictionnaire de Bayle, (tom. iii. p.
273--279.)]

[Footnote 2: Cantemir, (p. 115.) and the mosques which he founded,
attest his public regard for religion. Mahomet freely disputed with the
Gennadius on the two religions, (Spond. A.D. 1453, No. 22.)]

[Footnote 3: Quinque linguas præter suam noverat, Græcam, Latinam,
Chaldaicam, Persicam. The Latin translator of Phranza has dropped the
Arabic, which the Koran must recommend to every Mussulman. *

Note: * It appears in the original Greek text, p. 95, edit. Bonn. -- M.]

[Footnote 4: Philelphus, by a Latin ode, requested and obtained the
liberty of his wife's mother and sisters from the conqueror of
Constantinople. It was delivered into the sultan's hands by the envoys
of the duke of Milan. Philelphus himself was suspected of a design of
retiring to Constantinople; yet the orator often sounded the trumpet of
holy war, (see his Life by M. Lancelot, in the Mémoires de l'Académie
des Inscriptions, tom. x. p. 718, 724, &c.)]

[Footnote 5: Robert Valturio published at Verona, in 1483, his xii.
books de Re Militari, in which he first mentions the use of bombs. By
his patron Sigismund Malatesta, prince of Rimini, it had been addressed
with a Latin epistle to Mahomet II.]

[Footnote 6: According to Phranza, he assiduously studied the lives and
actions of Alexander, Augustus, Constantine, and Theodosius. I have read
somewhere, that Plutarch's Lives were translated by his orders into the
Turkish language. If the sultan himself understood Greek, it must have
been for the benefit of his subjects. Yet these lives are a school of
freedom as well as of valor.

Note:  Von Hammer disdainfully rejects this fable of Mahomet's knowledge
of languages. Knolles adds, that he delighted in reading the history of
Alexander the Great, and of Julius Cæsar. The former, no doubt, was the
Persian legend, which, it is remarkable, came back to Europe, and was
popular throughout the middle ages as the "Romaunt of Alexander." The
founder of the Imperial dynasty of Rome, according to M. Von Hammer, is
altogether unknown in the East. Mahomet was a great patron of Turkish
literature: the romantic poems of Persia were translated, or imitated,
under his patronage. Von Hammer vol ii. p. 268. -- M.]

[Footnote 7: The famous Gentile Bellino, whom he had invited from
Venice, was dismissed with a chain and collar of gold, and a purse of
3000 ducats. With Voltaire I laugh at the foolish story of a slave
purposely beheaded to instruct the painter in the action of the
muscles.]

[Footnote *: This story, the subject of Johnson's Irene, is rejected by
M. Von Hammer, vol. ii. p. 208. The German historian's general estimate
of Mahomet's character agrees in its more marked features with Gibbon's.
-- M.]

[Footnote 8: These Imperial drunkards were Soliman I., Selim II., and
Amurath IV., (Cantemir, p. 61.) The sophis of Persia can produce a more
regular succession; and in the last age, our European travellers were
the witnesses and companions of their revels.]

In the reign of Amurath, he twice tasted of royalty, and twice descended
from the throne: his tender age was incapable of opposing his father's
restoration, but never could he forgive the viziers who had recommended
that salutary measure. His nuptials were celebrated with the daughter of
a Turkman emir; and, after a festival of two months, he departed from
Adrianople with his bride, to reside in the government of Magnesia.
Before the end of six weeks, he was recalled by a sudden message from
the divan, which announced the decease of Amurath, and the mutinous
spirit of the Janizaries. His speed and vigor commanded their obedience:
he passed the Hellespont with a chosen guard: and at the distance of a
mile from Adrianople, the viziers and emirs, the imams and cadhis, the
soldiers and the people, fell prostrate before the new sultan. They
affected to weep, they affected to rejoice: he ascended the throne at
the age of twenty-one years, and removed the cause of sedition by the
death, the inevitable death, of his infant brothers. ^9 ^* The
ambassadors of Europe and Asia soon appeared to congratulate his
accession and solicit his friendship; and to all he spoke the language
of moderation and peace. The confidence of the Greek emperor was revived
by the solemn oaths and fair assurances with which he sealed the
ratification of the treaty: and a rich domain on the banks of the
Strymon was assigned for the annual payment of three hundred thousand
aspers, the pension of an Ottoman prince, who was detained at his
request in the Byzantine court. Yet the neighbors of Mahomet might
tremble at the severity with which a youthful monarch reformed the pomp
of his father's household: the expenses of luxury were applied to those
of ambition, and a useless train of seven thousand falconers was either
dismissed from his service, or enlisted in his troops. ^! In the first
summer of his reign, he visited with an army the Asiatic provinces; but
after humbling the pride, Mahomet accepted the submission, of the
Caramanian, that he might not be diverted by the smallest obstacle from
the execution of his great design. ^10

[Footnote 9: Calapin, one of these royal infants, was saved from his
cruel brother, and baptized at Rome under the name of Callistus
Othomannus. The emperor Frederic III. presented him with an estate in
Austria, where he ended his life; and Cuspinian, who in his youth
conversed with the aged prince at Vienna, applauds his piety and wisdom,
(de Cæsaribus, p. 672, 673.)]

[Footnote *: Ahmed, the son of a Greek princess, was the object of his
especial jealousy. Von Hammer, p. 501. -- M.]

[Footnote !: The Janizaries obtained, for the first time, a gift on the
accession of a new sovereign, p. 504. -- M.]

[Footnote 10: See the accession of Mahomet II. in Ducas, (c. 33,)
Phranza, (l. i. c. 33, l. iii. c. 2,) Chalcondyles, (l. vii. p. 199,)
and Cantemir, (p. 96.)]

The Mahometan, and more especially the Turkish casuists, have pronounced
that no promise can bind the faithful against the interest and duty of
their religion; and that the sultan may abrogate his own treaties and
those of his predecessors. The justice and magnanimity of Amurath had
scorned this immoral privilege; but his son, though the proudest of men,
could stoop from ambition to the basest arts of dissimulation and
deceit. Peace was on his lips, while war was in his heart: he
incessantly sighed for the possession of Constantinople; and the Greeks,
by their own indiscretion, afforded the first pretence of the fatal
rupture. ^11 Instead of laboring to be forgotten, their ambassadors
pursued his camp, to demand the payment, and even the increase, of their
annual stipend: the divan was importuned by their complaints, and the
vizier, a secret friend of the Christians, was constrained to deliver
the sense of his brethren. "Ye foolish and miserable Romans," said
Calil, "we know your devices, and ye are ignorant of your own danger!
The scrupulous Amurath is no more; his throne is occupied by a young
conqueror, whom no laws can bind, and no obstacles can resist: and if
you escape from his hands, give praise to the divine clemency, which yet
delays the chastisement of your sins. Why do ye seek to affright us by
vain and indirect menaces? Release the fugitive Orchan, crown him sultan
of Romania; call the Hungarians from beyond the Danube; arm against us
the nations of the West; and be assured, that you will only provoke and
precipitate your ruin." But if the fears of the ambassadors were alarmed
by the stern language of the vizier, they were soothed by the courteous
audience and friendly speeches of the Ottoman prince; and Mahomet
assured them that on his return to Adrianople he would redress the
grievances, and consult the true interests, of the Greeks. No sooner had
he repassed the Hellespont, than he issued a mandate to suppress their
pension, and to expel their officers from the banks of the Strymon: in
this measure he betrayed a hostile mind; and the second order announced,
and in some degree commenced, the siege of Constantinople. In the narrow
pass of the Bosphorus, an Asiatic fortress had formerly been raised by
his grandfather; in the opposite situation, on the European side, he
resolved to erect a more formidable castle; and a thousand masons were
commanded to assemble in the spring on a spot named Asomaton, about five
miles from the Greek metropolis. ^12 Persuasion is the resource of the
feeble; and the feeble can seldom persuade: the ambassadors of the
emperor attempted, without success, to divert Mahomet from the execution
of his design. They represented, that his grandfather had solicited the
permission of Manuel to build a castle on his own territories; but that
this double fortification, which would command the strait, could only
tend to violate the alliance of the nations; to intercept the Latins who
traded in the Black Sea, and perhaps to annihilate the subsistence of
the city. "I form the enterprise," replied the perfidious sultan,
"against the city; but the empire of Constantinople is measured by her
walls. Have you forgot the distress to which my father was reduced when
you formed a league with the Hungarians; when they invaded our country
by land, and the Hellespont was occupied by the French galleys? Amurath
was compelled to force the passage of the Bosphorus; and your strength
was not equal to your malevolence. I was then a child at Adrianople; the
Moslems trembled; and, for a while, the Gabours^13 insulted our
disgrace. But when my father had triumphed in the field of Warna, he
vowed to erect a fort on the western shore, and that vow it is my duty
to accomplish. Have ye the right, have ye the power, to control my
actions on my own ground? For that ground is my own: as far as the
shores of the Bosphorus, Asia is inhabited by the Turks, and Europe is
deserted by the Romans. Return, and inform your king, that the present
Ottoman is far different from his predecessors; that hisresolutions
surpass theirwishes; and that heperforms more thanthey could resolve.
Return in safety -- but the next who delivers a similar message may
expect to be flayed alive." After this declaration, Constantine, the
first of the Greeks in spirit as in rank, ^14 had determined to
unsheathe the sword, and to resist the approach and establishment of the
Turks on the Bosphorus. He was disarmed by the advice of his civil and
ecclesiastical ministers, who recommended a system less generous, and
even less prudent, than his own, to approve their patience and
long-suffering, to brand the Ottoman with the name and guilt of an
aggressor, and to depend on chance and time for their own safety, and
the destruction of a fort which could not long be maintained in the
neighborhood of a great and populous city. Amidst hope and fear, the
fears of the wise, and the hopes of the credulous, the winter rolled
away; the proper business of each man, and each hour, was postponed; and
the Greeks shut their eyes against the impending danger, till the
arrival of the spring and the sultan decide the assurance of their ruin.

[Footnote 11: Before I enter on the siege of Constantinople, I shall
observe, that except the short hints of Cantemir and Leunclavius, I have
not been able to obtain any Turkish account of this conquest; such an
account as we possess of the siege of Rhodes by Soliman II., (Mémoires
de l'Académie des Inscriptions, tom. xxvi. p. 723--769.) I must
therefore depend on the Greeks, whose prejudices, in some degree, are
subdued by their distress. Our standard texts ar those of Ducas, (c.
34--42,) Phranza, (l. iii. c. 7--20,) Chalcondyles, (l. viii. p.
201--214,) and Leonardus Chiensis, (Historia C. P. a Turco expugnatæ.
Norimberghæ, 1544, in 4to., 20 leaves.) The last of these narratives is
the earliest in date, since it was composed in the Isle of Chios, the
16th of August, 1453, only seventy-nine days after the loss of the city,
and in the first confusion of ideas and passions. Some hints may be
added from an epistle of Cardinal Isidore (in Farragine Rerum
Turcicarum, ad calcem Chalcondyl. Clauseri, Basil, 1556) to Pope
Nicholas V., and a tract of Theodosius Zygomala, which he addressed in
the year 1581 to Martin Crucius, (Turco-Græcia, l. i. p. 74--98, Basil,
1584.) The various facts and materials are briefly, though critically,
reviewed by Spondanus, (A.D. 1453, No. 1--27.) The hearsay relations of
Monstrelet and the distant Latins I shall take leave to disregard. *

Note: * M. Von Hammer has added little new information on the siege of
Constantinople, and, by his general agreement, has borne an honorable
testimony to the truth, and by his close imitation to the graphic spirit
and boldness, of Gibbon. -- M.]

[Footnote 12: The situation of the fortress, and the topography of the
Bosphorus, are best learned from Peter Gyllius, (de Bosphoro Thracio, l.
ii. c. 13,) Leunclavius, (Pandect. p. 445,) and Tournefort, (Voyage dans
le Levant, tom. ii. lettre xv. p. 443, 444;) but I must regret the map
or plan which Tournefort sent to the French minister of the marine. The
reader may turn back to chap. xvii. of this History.]

[Footnote 13: The opprobrious name which the Turks bestow on the
infidels, is expressed Kabour by Ducas, and Giaourby Leunclavius and the
moderns. The former term is derived by Ducange (Gloss. Græc tom. i. p.
530) from Kabouron, in vulgar Greek, a tortoise, as denoting a
retrograde motion from the faith. But alas! Gabouris no more than
Gheber, which was transferred from the Persian to the Turkish language,
from the worshippers of fire to those of the crucifix, (D'Herbelot,
Bibliot. Orient. p. 375.)]

[Footnote 14: Phranza does justice to his master's sense and courage.
Calliditatem hominis non ignorans Imperator prior arma movere
constituit, and stigmatizes the folly of the cum sacri tum profani
proceres, which he had heard, amentes spe vanâpasci. Ducas was not a
privy-counsellor.]

Of a master who never forgives, the orders are seldom disobeyed. On the
twenty-sixth of March, the appointed spot of Asomaton was covered with
an active swarm of Turkish artificers; and the materials by sea and land
were diligently transported from Europe and Asia. ^15 The lime had been
burnt in Cataphrygia; the timber was cut down in the woods of Heraclea
and Nicomedia; and the stones were dug from the Anatolian quarries. Each
of the thousand masons was assisted by two workmen; and a measure of two
cubits was marked for their daily task. The fortress ^16 was built in a
triangular form; each angle was flanked by a strong and massy tower; one
on the declivity of the hill, two along the sea-shore: a thickness of
twenty-two feet was assigned for the walls, thirty for the towers; and
the whole building was covered with a solid platform of lead. Mahomet
himself pressed and directed the work with indefatigable ardor: his
three viziers claimed the honor of finishing their respective towers;
the zeal of the cadhis emulated that of the Janizaries; the meanest
labor was ennobled by the service of God and the sultan; and the
diligence of the multitude was quickened by the eye of a despot, whose
smile was the hope of fortune, and whose frown was the messenger of
death. The Greek emperor beheld with terror the irresistible progress of
the work; and vainly strove, by flattery and gifts, to assuage an
implacable foe, who sought, and secretly fomented, the slightest
occasion of a quarrel. Such occasions must soon and inevitably be found.
The ruins of stately churches, and even the marble columns which had
been consecrated to Saint Michael the archangel, were employed without
scruple by the profane and rapacious Moslems; and some Christians, who
presumed to oppose the removal, received from their hands the crown of
martyrdom. Constantine had solicited a Turkish guard to protect the
fields and harvests of his subjects: the guard was fixed; but their
first order was to allow free pasture to the mules and horses of the
camp, and to defend their brethren if they should be molested by the
natives. The retinue of an Ottoman chief had left their horses to pass
the night among the ripe corn; the damage was felt; the insult was
resented; and several of both nations were slain in a tumultuous
conflict. Mahomet listened with joy to the complaint; and a detachment
was commanded to exterminate the guilty village: the guilty had fled;
but forty innocent and unsuspecting reapers were massacred by the
soldiers. Till this provocation, Constantinople had been opened to the
visits of commerce and curiosity: on the first alarm, the gates were
shut; but the emperor, still anxious for peace, released on the third
day his Turkish captives; ^17 and expressed, in a last message, the firm
resignation of a Christian and a soldier. "Since neither oaths, nor
treaty, nor submission, can secure peace, pursue," said he to Mahomet,
"your impious warfare. My trust is in God alone; if it should please him
to mollify your heart, I shall rejoice in the happy change; if he
delivers the city into your hands, I submit without a murmur to his holy
will. But until the Judge of the earth shall pronounce between us, it is
my duty to live and die in the defence of my people." The sultan's
answer was hostile and decisive: his fortifications were completed; and
before his departure for Adrianople, he stationed a vigilant Aga and
four hundred Janizaries, to levy a tribute on the ships of every nation
that should pass within the reach of their cannon. A Venetian vessel,
refusing obedience to the new lords of the Bosphorus, was sunk with a
single bullet. ^* The master and thirty sailors escaped in the boat; but
they were dragged in chains to the Porte: the chief was impaled; his
companions were beheaded; and the historian Ducas ^18 beheld, at
Demotica, their bodies exposed to the wild beasts. The siege of
Constantinople was deferred till the ensuing spring; but an Ottoman army
marched into the Morea to divert the force of the brothers of
Constantine. At this æra of calamity, one of these princes, the despot
Thomas, was blessed or afflicted with the birth of a son; "the last
heir," says the plaintive Phranza, "of the last spark of the Roman
empire." ^19

[Footnote 15: Instead of this clear and consistent account, the Turkish
Annals (Cantemir, p. 97) revived the foolish tale of the ox's hide, and
Dido's stratagem in the foundation of Carthage. These annals (unless we
are swayed by an anti-Christian prejudice) are far less valuable than
the Greek historians.]

[Footnote 16: In the dimensions of this fortress, the old castle of
Europe, Phranza does not exactly agree with Chalcondyles, whose
description has been verified on the spot by his editor Leunclavius.]

[Footnote 17: Among these were some pages of Mahomet, so conscious of
his inexorable rigor, that they begged to lose their heads in the city
unless they could return before sunset.]

[Footnote *: This was from a model cannon cast by Urban the Hungarian.
See p. 291. Von Hammer. p. 510. -- M.]

[Footnote 18: Ducas, c. 35. Phranza, (l. iii. c. 3,) who had sailed in
his vessel, commemorates the Venetian pilot as a martyr.]

[Footnote 19: Auctum est Palæologorum genus, et Imperii successor,
parvæque Romanorum scintillæhæres natus, Andreas, &c., (Phranza, l. iii.
c. 7.) The strong expression was inspired by his feelings.]

The Greeks and the Turks passed an anxious and sleepless winter: the
former were kept awake by their fears, the latter by their hopes; both
by the preparations of defence and attack; and the two emperors, who had
the most to lose or to gain, were the most deeply affected by the
national sentiment. In Mahomet, that sentiment was inflamed by the ardor
of his youth and temper: he amused his leisure with building at
Adrianople ^20 the lofty palace of Jehan Numa, (the watchtower of the
world;) but his serious thoughts were irrevocably bent on the conquest
of the city of Cæsar. At the dead of night, about the second watch, he
started from his bed, and commanded the instant attendance of his prime
vizier. The message, the hour, the prince, and his own situation,
alarmed the guilty conscience of Calil Basha; who had possessed the
confidence, and advised the restoration, of Amurath. On the accession of
the son, the vizier was confirmed in his office and the appearances of
favor; but the veteran statesman was not insensible that he trod on a
thin and slippery ice, which might break under his footsteps, and plunge
him in the abyss. His friendship for the Christians, which might be
innocent under the late reign, had stigmatized him with the name of
Gabour Ortachi, or foster-brother of the infidels; ^21 and his avarice
entertained a venal and treasonable correspondence, which was detected
and punished after the conclusion of the war. On receiving the royal
mandate, he embraced, perhaps for the last time, his wife and children;
filled a cup with pieces of gold, hastened to the palace, adored the
sultan, and offered, according to the Oriental custom, the slight
tribute of his duty and gratitude. ^22 "It is not my wish," said
Mahomet, "to resume my gifts, but rather to heap and multiply them on
thy head. In my turn, I ask a present far more valuable and important;
-- Constantinople." As soon as the vizier had recovered from his
surprise, "The same God," said he, "who has already given thee so large
a portion of the Roman empire, will not deny the remnant, and the
capital. His providence, and thy power, assure thy success; and myself,
with the rest of thy faithful slaves, will sacrifice our lives and
fortunes." -- "Lala," ^23 (or preceptor,) continued the sultan, "do you
see this pillow? All the night, in my agitation, I have pulled it on one
side and the other; I have risen from my bed, again have I lain down;
yet sleep has not visited these weary eyes. Beware of the gold and
silver of the Romans: in arms we are superior; and with the aid of God,
and the prayers of the prophet, we shall speedily become masters of
Constantinople." To sound the disposition of his soldiers, he often
wandered through the streets alone, and in disguise; and it was fatal to
discover the sultan, when he wished to escape from the vulgar eye. His
hours were spent in delineating the plan of the hostile city; in
debating with his generals and engineers, on what spot he should erect
his batteries; on which side he should assault the walls; where he
should spring his mines; to what place he should apply his
scaling-ladders: and the exercises of the day repeated and proved the
lucubrations of the night.

[Footnote 20: Cantemir, p. 97, 98. The sultan was either doubtful of his
conquest, or ignorant of the superior merits of Constantinople. A city
or a kingdom may sometimes be ruined by the Imperial fortune of their
sovereign.]

[Footnote 21: SuntrojoV, by the president Cousin, is translated
pèrenourricier, most correctly indeed from the Latin version; but in his
haste he has overlooked the note by which Ishmael Boillaud (ad Ducam, c.
35) acknowledges and rectifies his own error.]

[Footnote 22: The Oriental custom of never appearing without gifts
before a sovereign or a superior is of high antiquity, and seems
analogous with the idea of sacrifice, still more ancient and universal.
See the examples of such Persian gifts, Ælian, Hist. Var. l. i. c. 31,
32, 33.]

[Footnote 23: The Lalaof the Turks (Cantemir, p. 34) and the Tataof the
Greeks (Ducas, c. 35) are derived from the natural language of children;
and it may be observed, that all such primitive words which denote their
parents, are the simple repetition of one syllable, composed of a labial
or a dental consonant and an open vowel, (Des Brosses, Méchanisme des
Langues, tom. i. p. 231--247.)]

Chapter LXVIII: Reign Of Mahomet The Second, Extinction Of Eastern
Empire. -- Part II.

Among the implements of destruction, he studied with peculiar care the
recent and tremendous discovery of the Latins; and his artillery
surpassed whatever had yet appeared in the world. A founder of cannon, a
Dane ^* or Hungarian, who had been almost starved in the Greek service,
deserted to the Moslems, and was liberally entertained by the Turkish
sultan. Mahomet was satisfied with the answer to his first question,
which he eagerly pressed on the artist. "Am I able to cast a cannon
capable of throwing a ball or stone of sufficient size to batter the
walls of Constantinople? I am not ignorant of their strength; but were
they more solid than those of Babylon, I could oppose an engine of
superior power: the position and management of that engine must be left
to your engineers." On this assurance, a foundry was established at
Adrianople: the metal was prepared; and at the end of three months,
Urban produced a piece of brass ordnance of stupendous, and almost
incredible magnitude; a measure of twelve palms is assigned to the bore;
and the stone bullet weighed above six hundred pounds. ^24 ^* A vacant
place before the new palace was chosen for the first experiment; but to
prevent the sudden and mischievous effects of astonishment and fear, a
proclamation was issued, that the cannon would be discharged the ensuing
day. The explosion was felt or heard in a circuit of a hundred furlongs:
the ball, by the force of gunpowder, was driven above a mile; and on the
spot where it fell, it buried itself a fathom deep in the ground. For
the conveyance of this destructive engine, a frame or carriage of thirty
wagons was linked together and drawn along by a team of sixty oxen: two
hundred men on both sides were stationed, to poise and support the
rolling weight; two hundred and fifty workmen marched before to smooth
the way and repair the bridges; and near two months were employed in a
laborious journey of one hundred and fifty miles. A lively philosopher
^25 derides on this occasion the credulity of the Greeks, and observes,
with much reason, that we should always distrust the exaggerations of a
vanquished people. He calculates, that a ball, even o two hundred
pounds, would require a charge of one hundred and fifty pounds of
powder; and that the stroke would be feeble and impotent, since not a
fifteenth part of the mass could be inflamed at the same moment. A
stranger as I am to the art of destruction, I can discern that the
modern improvements of artillery prefer the number of pieces to the
weight of metal; the quickness of the fire to the sound, or even the
consequence, of a single explosion. Yet I dare not reject the positive
and unanimous evidence of contemporary writers; nor can it seem
improbable, that the first artists, in their rude and ambitious efforts,
should have transgressed the standard of moderation. A Turkish cannon,
more enormous than that of Mahomet, still guards the entrance of the
Dardanelles; and if the use be inconvenient, it has been found on a late
trial that the effect was far from contemptible. A stone bullet of
elevenhundred pounds' weight was once discharged with three hundred and
thirty pounds of powder: at the distance of six hundred yards it
shivered into three rocky fragments; traversed the strait; and leaving
the waters in a foam, again rose and bounded against the opposite hill.
^26

[Footnote *: Gibbon has written Dane by mistake for Dace, or Dacian. Lax
ti kinoV?. Chalcondyles, Von Hammer, p. 510. -- M.]

[Footnote 24: The Attic talent weighed about sixty minæ, or avoirdupois
pounds (see Hooper on Ancient Weights, Measures, &c.;) but among the
modern Greeks, that classic appellation was extended to a weight of one
hundred, or one hundred and twenty-five pounds, (Ducange, talanton.)
Leonardus Chiensis measured the ball or stone of the secondcannon
Lapidem, qui palmis undecim ex meis ambibat in gyro.]

[Footnote *: 1200, according to Leonardus Chiensis. Von Hammer states
that he had himself seen the great cannon of the Dardanelles, in which a
tailor who had run away from his creditors, had concealed himself
several days Von Hammer had measured balls twelve spans round. Note. p.
666. -- M.]

[Footnote 25: See Voltaire, (Hist. Générale, c. xci. p. 294, 295.) He
was ambitious of universal monarchy; and the poet frequently aspires to
the name and style of an astronomer, a chemist, &c.]

[Footnote 26: The Baron de Tott, (tom. iii. p. 85--89,) who fortified
the Dardanelles against the Russians, describes in a lively, and even
comic, strain his own prowess, and the consternation of the Turks. But
that adventurous traveller does not possess the art of gaining our
confidence.]

While Mahomet threatened the capital of the East, the Greek emperor
implored with fervent prayers the assistance of earth and heaven. But
the invisible powers were deaf to his supplications; and Christendom
beheld with indifference the fall of Constantinople, while she derived
at least some promise of supply from the jealous and temporal policy of
the sultan of Egypt. Some states were too weak, and others too remote;
by some the danger was considered as imaginary by others as inevitable:
the Western princes were involved in their endless and domestic
quarrels; and the Roman pontiff was exasperated by the falsehood or
obstinacy of the Greeks. Instead of employing in their favor the arms
and treasures of Italy, Nicholas the Fifth had foretold their
approaching ruin; and his honor was engaged in the accomplishment of his
prophecy. ^* Perhaps he was softened by the last extremity o their
distress; but his compassion was tardy; his efforts were faint and
unavailing; and Constantinople had fallen, before the squadrons of Genoa
and Venice could sail from their harbors. ^27 Even the princes of the
Morea and of the Greek islands affected a cold neutrality: the Genoese
colony of Galata negotiated a private treaty; and the sultan indulged
them in the delusive hope, that by his clemency they might survive the
ruin of the empire. A plebeian crowd, and some Byzantine nobles basely
withdrew from the danger of their country; and the avarice of the rich
denied the emperor, and reserved for the Turks, the secret treasures
which might have raised in their defence whole armies of mercenaries.
^28 The indigent and solitary prince prepared, however, to sustain his
formidable adversary; but if his courage were equal to the peril, his
strength was inadequate to the contest. In the beginning of the spring,
the Turkish vanguard swept the towns and villages as far as the gates of
Constantinople: submission was spared and protected; whatever presumed
to resist was exterminated with fire and sword. The Greek places on the
Black Sea, Mesembria, Acheloum, and Bizon, surrendered on the first
summons; Selybria alone deserved the honors of a siege or blockade; and
the bold inhabitants, while they were invested by land, launched their
boats, pillaged the opposite coast of Cyzicus, and sold their captives
in the public market. But on the approach of Mahomet himself all was
silent and prostrate: he first halted at the distance of five miles; and
from thence advancing in battle array, planted before the gates of St.
Romanus the Imperial standard; and on the sixth day of April formed the
memorable siege of Constantinople.

[Footnote *: See the curious Christian and Mahometan predictions of the
fall of Constantinople, Von Hammer, p. 518. -- M.]

[Footnote 27: Non audivit, indignum ducens, says the honest Antoninus;
but as the Roman court was afterwards grieved and ashamed, we find the
more courtly expression of Platina, in animo fuisse pontifici juvare
Græcos, and the positive assertion of Æneas Sylvius, structam classem
&c. (Spond. A.D. 1453, No. 3.)]

[Footnote 28: Antonin. in Proem. -- Epist. Cardinal. Isidor. apud
Spondanum and Dr. Johnson, in the tragedy of Irene, has happily seized
this characteristic circumstance: --

The groaning Greeks dig up the golden caverns.

The accumulated wealth of hoarding ages;

That wealth which, granted to their weeping prince,

Had ranged embattled nations at their gates.

11]

The troops of Asia and Europe extended on the right and left from the
Propontis to the harbor; the Janizaries in the front were stationed
before the sultan's tent; the Ottoman line was covered by a deep
intrenchment; and a subordinate army enclosed the suburb of Galata, and
watched the doubtful faith of the Genoese. The inquisitive Philelphus,
who resided in Greece about thirty years before the siege, is confident,
that all the Turkish forces of any name or value could not exceed the
number of sixty thousand horse and twenty thousand foot; and he upbraids
the pusillanimity of the nations, who had tamely yielded to a handful of
Barbarians. Such indeed might be the regular establishment of the
Capiculi, ^29 the troops of the Porte who marched with the prince, and
were paid from his royal treasury. But the bashaws, in their respective
governments, maintained or levied a provincial militia; many lands were
held by a military tenure; many volunteers were attracted by the hope of
spoil and the sound of the holy trumpet invited a swarm of hungry and
fearless fanatics, who might contribute at least to multiply the
terrors, and in a first attack to blunt the swords, of the Christians.
The whole mass of the Turkish powers is magnified by Ducas,
Chalcondyles, and Leonard of Chios, to the amount of three or four
hundred thousand men; but Phranza was a less remote and more accurate
judge; and his precise definition of two hundred and fifty-eight
thousand does not exceed the measure of experience and probability. ^30
The navy of the besiegers was less formidable: the Propontis was
overspread with three hundred and twenty sail; but of these no more than
eighteen could be rated as galleys of war; and the far greater part must
be degraded to the condition of store-ships and transports, which poured
into the camp fresh supplies of men, ammunition, and provisions. In her
last decay, Constantinople was still peopled with more than a hundred
thousand inhabitants; but these numbers are found in the accounts, not
of war, but of captivity; and they mostly consisted of mechanics, of
priests, of women, and of men devoid of that spirit which even women
have sometimes exerted for the common safety. I can suppose, I could
almost excuse, the reluctance of subjects to serve on a distant
frontier, at the will of a tyrant; but the man who dares not expose his
life in the defence of his children and his property, has lost in
society the first and most active energies of nature. By the emperor's
command, a particular inquiry had been made through the streets and
houses, how many of the citizens, or even of the monks, were able and
willing to bear arms for their country. The lists were intrusted to
Phranza; ^31 and, after a diligent addition, he informed his master,
with grief and surprise, that the national defence was reduced to four
thousand nine hundred and seventy Romans. Between Constantine and his
faithful minister this comfortless secret was preserved; and a
sufficient proportion of shields, cross-bows, and muskets, were
distributed from the arsenal to the city bands. They derived some
accession from a body of two thousand strangers, under the command of
John Justiniani, a noble Genoese; a liberal donative was advanced to
these auxiliaries; and a princely recompense, the Isle of Lemnos, was
promised to the valor and victory of their chief. A strong chain was
drawn across the mouth of the harbor: it was supported by some Greek and
Italian vessels of war and merchandise; and the ships of every Christian
nation, that successively arrived from Candia and the Black Sea, were
detained for the public service. Against the powers of the Ottoman
empire, a city of the extent of thirteen, perhaps of sixteen, miles was
defended by a scanty garrison of seven or eight thousand soldiers.
Europe and Asia were open to the besiegers; but the strength and
provisions of the Greeks must sustain a daily decrease; nor could they
indulge the expectation of any foreign succor or supply.

[Footnote 29: The palatine troops are styled Capiculi, the provincials,
Seratculi; and most of the names and institutions of the Turkish militia
existed before the Canon Namehof Soliman II, from which, and his own
experience, Count Marsigli has composed his military state of the
Ottoman empire.]

[Footnote 30: The observation of Philelphus is approved by Cuspinian in
the year 1508, (de Cæsaribus, in Epilog. de MilitiâTurcicâ, p. 697.)
Marsigli proves, that the effective armies of the Turks are much less
numerous than they appear. In the army that besieged Constantinople
Leonardus Chiensis reckons no more than 15,000 Janizaries.]

[Footnote 31: Ego, eidem (Imp.) tabellas extribui non absque dolore et
mstitia, mansitque apud nos duos aliis occultus numerus, (Phranza, l.
iii. c. 8.) With some indulgence for national prejudices, we cannot
desire a more authentic witness, not only of public facts, but of
private counsels.]

The primitive Romans would have drawn their swords in the resolution of
death or conquest. The primitive Christians might have embraced each
other, and awaited in patience and charity the stroke of martyrdom. But
the Greeks of Constantinople were animated only by the spirit of
religion, and that spirit was productive only of animosity and discord.
Before his death, the emperor John Palæologus had renounced the
unpopular measure of a union with the Latins; nor was the idea revived,
till the distress of his brother Constantine imposed a last trial of
flattery and dissimulation. ^32 With the demand of temporal aid, his
ambassadors were instructed to mingle the assurance of spiritual
obedience: his neglect of the church was excused by the urgent cares of
the state; and his orthodox wishes solicited the presence of a Roman
legate. The Vatican had been too often deluded; yet the signs of
repentance could not decently be overlooked; a legate was more easily
granted than an army; and about six months before the final destruction,
the cardinal Isidore of Russia appeared in that character with a retinue
of priests and soldiers. The emperor saluted him as a friend and father;
respectfully listened to his public and private sermons; and with the
most obsequious of the clergy and laymen subscribed the act of union, as
it had been ratified in the council of Florence. On the twelfth of
December, the two nations, in the church of St. Sophia, joined in the
communion of sacrifice and prayer; and the names of the two pontiffs
were solemnly commemorated; the names of Nicholas the Fifth, the vicar
of Christ, and of the patriarch Gregory, who had been driven into exile
by a rebellious people.

[Footnote 32: In Spondanus, the narrative of the union is not only
partial, but imperfect. The bishop of Pamiers died in 1642, and the
history of Ducas, which represents these scenes (c. 36, 37) with such
truth and spirit, was not printed till the year 1649.]

But the dress and language of the Latin priest who officiated at the
altar were an object of scandal; and it was observed with horror, that
he consecrated a cake or wafer of unleavenedbread, and poured cold water
into the cup of the sacrament. A national historian acknowledges with a
blush, that none of his countrymen, not the emperor himself, were
sincere in this occasional conformity. ^33 Their hasty and unconditional
submission was palliated by a promise of future revisal; but the best,
or the worst, of their excuses was the confession of their own perjury.
When they were pressed by the reproaches of their honest brethren, "Have
patience," they whispered, "have patience till God shall have delivered
the city from the great dragon who seeks to devour us. You shall then
perceive whether we are truly reconciled with the Azymites." But
patience is not the attribute of zeal; nor can the arts of a court be
adapted to the freedom and violence of popular enthusiasm. From the dome
of St. Sophia the inhabitants of either sex, and of every degree, rushed
in crowds to the cell of the monk Gennadius, ^34 to consult the oracle
of the church. The holy man was invisible; entranced, as it should seem,
in deep meditation, or divine rapture: but he had exposed on the door of
his cell a speaking tablet; and they successively withdrew, after
reading those tremendous words: "O miserable Romans, why will ye abandon
the truth? and why, instead of confiding in God, will ye put your trust
in the Italians? In losing your faith you will lose your city. Have
mercy on me, O Lord! I protest in thy presence that I am innocent of the
crime. O miserable Romans, consider, pause, and repent. At the same
moment that you renounce the religion of your fathers, by embracing
impiety, you submit to a foreign servitude." According to the advice of
Gennadius, the religious virgins, as pure as angels, and as proud as
dæmons, rejected the act of union, and abjured all communion with the
present and future associates of the Latins; and their example was
applauded and imitated by the greatest part of the clergy and people.
From the monastery, the devout Greeks dispersed themselves in the
taverns; drank confusion to the slaves of the pope; emptied their
glasses in honor of the image of the holy Virgin; and besought her to
defend against Mahomet the city which she had formerly saved from
Chosroes and the Chagan. In the double intoxication of zeal and wine,
they valiantly exclaimed, "What occasion have we for succor, or union,
or Latins? Far from us be the worship of the Azymites!" During the
winter that preceded the Turkish conquest, the nation was distracted by
this epidemical frenzy; and the season of Lent, the approach of Easter,
instead of breathing charity and love, served only to fortify the
obstinacy and influence of the zealots. The confessors scrutinized and
alarmed the conscience of their votaries, and a rigorous penance was
imposed on those who had received the communion from a priest who had
given an express or tacit consent to the union. His service at the altar
propagated the infection to the mute and simple spectators of the
ceremony: they forfeited, by the impure spectacle, the virtue of the
sacerdotal character; nor was it lawful, even in danger of sudden death,
to invoke the assistance of their prayers or absolution. No sooner had
the church of St. Sophia been polluted by the Latin sacrifice, than it
was deserted as a Jewish synagogue, or a heathen temple, by the clergy
and people; and a vast and gloomy silence prevailed in that venerable
dome, which had so often smoked with a cloud of incense, blazed with
innumerable lights, and resounded with the voice of prayer and
thanksgiving. The Latins were the most odious of heretics and infidels;
and the first minister of the empire, the great duke, was heard to
declare, that he had rather behold in Constantinople the turban of
Mahomet, than the pope's tiara or a cardinal's hat. ^35 A sentiment so
unworthy of Christians and patriots was familiar and fatal to the
Greeks: the emperor was deprived of the affection and support of his
subjects; and their native cowardice was sanctified by resignation to
the divine decree, or the visionary hope of a miraculous deliverance.

[Footnote 33: Phranza, one of the conforming Greeks, acknowledges that
the measure was adopted only propter spem auxilii; he affirms with
pleasure, that those who refused to perform their devotions in St.
Sophia, extra culpam et in pace essent, (l. iii. c. 20.)]

[Footnote 34: His primitive and secular name was George Scholarius,
which he changed for that of Gennadius, either when he became a monk or
a patriarch. His defence, at Florence, of the same union, which he so
furiously attacked at Constantinople, has tempted Leo Allatius (Diatrib.
de Georgiis, in Fabric. Bibliot. Græc. tom. x. p. 760--786) to divide
him into two men; but Renaudot (p. 343--383) has restored the identity
of his person and the duplicity of his character.]

[Footnote 35: Fakiolion, kaluptra, may be fairly translated a cardinal's
hat. The difference of the Greek and Latin habits imbittered the
schism.]

Of the triangle which composes the figure of Constantinople, the two
sides along the sea were made inaccessible to an enemy; the Propontis by
nature, and the harbor by art. Between the two waters, the basis of the
triangle, the land side was protected by a double wall, and a deep ditch
of the depth of one hundred feet. Against this line of fortification,
which Phranza, an eye-witness, prolongs to the measure of six miles, ^36
the Ottomans directed their principal attack; and the emperor, after
distributing the service and command of the most perilous stations,
undertook the defence of the external wall. In the first days of the
siege the Greek soldiers descended into the ditch, or sallied into the
field; but they soon discovered, that, in the proportion of their
numbers, one Christian was of more value than twenty Turks: and, after
these bold preludes, they were prudently content to maintain the rampart
with their missile weapons. Nor should this prudence be accused of
pusillanimity. The nation was indeed pusillanimous and base; but the
last Constantine deserves the name of a hero: his noble band of
volunteers was inspired with Roman virtue; and the foreign auxiliaries
supported the honor of the Western chivalry. The incessant volleys of
lances and arrows were accompanied with the smoke, the sound, and the
fire, of their musketry and cannon. Their small arms discharged at the
same time either five, or even ten, balls of lead, of the size of a
walnut; and, according to the closeness of the ranks and the force of
the powder, several breastplates and bodies were transpierced by the
same shot. But the Turkish approaches were soon sunk in trenches, or
covered with ruins. Each day added to the science of the Christians; but
their inadequate stock of gunpowder was wasted in the operations of each
day. Their ordnance was not powerful, either in size or number; and if
they possessed some heavy cannon, they feared to plant them on the
walls, lest the aged structure should be shaken and overthrown by the
explosion. ^37 The same destructive secret had been revealed to the
Moslems; by whom it was employed with the superior energy of zeal,
riches, and despotism. The great cannon of Mahomet has been separately
noticed; an important and visible object in the history of the times:
but that enormous engine was flanked by two fellows almost of equal
magnitude: ^38 the long order of the Turkish artillery was pointed
against the walls; fourteen batteries thundered at once on the most
accessible places; and of one of these it is ambiguously expressed, that
it was mounted with one hundred and thirty guns, or that it discharged
one hundred and thirty bullets. Yet in the power and activity of the
sultan, we may discern the infancy of the new science. Under a master
who counted the moments, the great cannon could be loaded and fired no
more than seven times in one day. ^39 The heated metal unfortunately
burst; several workmen were destroyed; and the skill of an artist ^* was
admired who bethought himself of preventing the danger and the accident,
by pouring oil, after each explosion, into the mouth of the cannon.

[Footnote 36: We are obliged to reduce the Greek miles to the smallest
measure which is preserved in the wersts of Russia, of 547 French
toises, and of 104 2/5 to a degree. The six miles of Phranza do not
exceed four English miles, (D'Anville, Mesures Itineraires, p. 61, 123,
&c.)]

[Footnote 37: At indies doctiores nostri facti paravere contra hostes
machinamenta, quætamen avare dabantur. Pulvis erat nitri modica exigua;
tela modica; bombardæ, si aderant incommoditate loci primum hostes
offendere, maceriebus alveisque tectos, non poterant. Nam si
quæmagnæerant, ne murus concuteretur noster, quiescebant. This passage
of Leonardus Chiensis is curious and important.]

[Footnote 38: According to Chalcondyles and Phranza, the great cannon
burst; an incident which, according to Ducas, was prevented by the
artist's skill. It is evident that they do not speak of the same gun. *

Note: * They speak, one of a Byzantine, one of a Turkish, gun. Von
Hammer note, p. 669.]

[Footnote 39: Near a hundred years after the siege of Constantinople,
the French and English fleets in the Channel were proud of firing 300
shot in an engagement of two hours, (Mémoires de Martin du Bellay, l.
x., in the Collection Générale, tom. xxi. p. 239.)]

[Footnote *: The founder of the gun. Von Hammer, p. 526.]

The first random shots were productive of more sound than effect; and it
was by the advice of a Christian, that the engineers were taught to
level their aim against the two opposite sides of the salient angles of
a bastion. However imperfect, the weight and repetition of the fire made
some impression on the walls; and the Turks, pushing their approaches to
the edge of the ditch, attempted to fill the enormous chasm, and to
build a road to the assault. ^40 Innumerable fascines, and hogsheads,
and trunks of trees, were heaped on each other; and such was the
impetuosity of the throng, that the foremost and the weakest were pushed
headlong down the precipice, and instantly buried under the accumulated
mass. To fill the ditch was the toil of the besiegers; to clear away the
rubbish was the safety of the besieged; and after a long and bloody
conflict, the web that had been woven in the day was still unravelled in
the night. The next resource of Mahomet was the practice of mines; but
the soil was rocky; in every attempt he was stopped and undermined by
the Christian engineers; nor had the art been yet invented of
replenishing those subterraneous passages with gunpowder, and blowing
whole towers and cities into the air. ^41 A circumstance that
distinguishes the siege of Constantinople is the reunion of the ancient
and modern artillery. The cannon were intermingled with the mechanical
engines for casting stones and darts; the bullet and the battering-ram
^* were directed against the same walls: nor had the discovery of
gunpowder superseded the use of the liquid and unextinguishable fire. A
wooden turret of the largest size was advanced on rollers this portable
magazine of ammunition and fascines was protected by a threefold
covering of bulls' hides: incessant volleys were securely discharged
from the loop-holes; in the front, three doors were contrived for the
alternate sally and retreat of the soldiers and workmen. They ascended
by a staircase to the upper platform, and, as high as the level of that
platform, a scaling-ladder could be raised by pulleys to form a bridge,
and grapple with the adverse rampart. By these various arts of
annoyance, some as new as they were pernicious to the Greeks, the tower
of St. Romanus was at length overturned: after a severe struggle, the
Turks were repulsed from the breach, and interrupted by darkness; but
they trusted that with the return of light they should renew the attack
with fresh vigor and decisive success. Of this pause of action, this
interval of hope, each moment was improved, by the activity of the
emperor and Justiniani, who passed the night on the spot, and urged the
labors which involved the safety of the church and city. At the dawn of
day, the impatient sultan perceived, with astonishment and grief, that
his wooden turret had been reduced to ashes: the ditch was cleared and
restored; and the tower of St. Romanus was again strong and entire. He
deplored the failure of his design; and uttered a profane exclamation,
that the word of the thirty-seven thousand prophets should not have
compelled him to believe that such a work, in so short a time, could
have been accomplished by the infidels.

[Footnote 40: I have selected some curious facts, without striving to
emulate the bloody and obstinate eloquence of the abbéde Vertot, in his
prolix descriptions of the sieges of Rhodes, Malta, &c. But that
agreeable historian had a turn for romance; and as he wrote to please
the order he had adopted the same spirit of enthusiasm and chivalry.]

[Footnote 41: The first theory of mines with gunpowder appears in 1480
in a MS. of George of Sienna, (Tiraboschi, tom. vi. P. i. p. 324.) They
were first practised by Sarzanella, in 1487; but the honor and
improvement in 1503 is ascribed to Peter of Navarre, who used them with
success in the wars of Italy, (Hist. de la Ligue de Cambray, tom. ii. p.
93--97.)]

[Footnote *: The battering-ram according to Von Hammer, (p. 670,) was
not used. -- M.]

Chapter LXVIII: Reign Of Mahomet The Second, Extinction Of Eastern
Empire. -- Part III.

The generosity of the Christian princes was cold and tardy; but in the
first apprehension of a siege, Constantine had negotiated, in the isles
of the Archipelago, the Morea, and Sicily, the most indispensable
supplies. As early as the beginning of April, five ^42 great ships,
equipped for merchandise and war, would have sailed from the harbor of
Chios, had not the wind blown obstinately from the north. ^43 One of
these ships bore the Imperial flag; the remaining four belonged to the
Genoese; and they were laden with wheat and barley, with wine, oil, and
vegetables, and, above all, with soldiers and mariners for the service
of the capital. After a tedious delay, a gentle breeze, and, on the
second day, a strong gale from the south, carried them through the
Hellespont and the Propontis: but the city was already invested by sea
and land; and the Turkish fleet, at the entrance of the Bosphorus, was
stretched from shore to shore, in the form of a crescent, to intercept,
or at least to repel, these bold auxiliaries. The reader who has present
to his mind the geographical picture of Constantinople, will conceive
and admire the greatness of the spectacle. The five Christian ships
continued to advance with joyful shouts, and a full press both of sails
and oars, against a hostile fleet of three hundred vessels; and the
rampart, the camp, the coasts of Europe and Asia, were lined with
innumerable spectators, who anxiously awaited the event of this
momentous succor. At the first view that event could not appear
doubtful; the superiority of the Moslems was beyond all measure or
account: and, in a calm, their numbers and valor must inevitably have
prevailed. But their hasty and imperfect navy had been created, not by
the genius of the people, but by the will of the sultan: in the height
of their prosperity, the Turks have acknowledged, that if God had given
them the earth, he had left the sea to the infidels; ^44 and a series of
defeats, a rapid progress of decay, has established the truth of their
modest confession. Except eighteen galleys of some force, the rest of
their fleet consisted of open boats, rudely constructed and awkwardly
managed, crowded with troops, and destitute of cannon; and since courage
arises in a great measure from the consciousness of strength, the
bravest of the Janizaries might tremble on a new element. In the
Christian squadron, five stout and lofty ships were guided by skilful
pilots, and manned with the veterans of Italy and Greece, long practised
in the arts and perils of the sea. Their weight was directed to sink or
scatter the weak obstacles that impeded their passage: their artillery
swept the waters: their liquid fire was poured on the heads of the
adversaries, who, with the design of boarding, presumed to approach
them; and the winds and waves are always on the side of the ablest
navigators. In this conflict, the Imperial vessel, which had been almost
overpowered, was rescued by the Genoese; but the Turks, in a distant and
closer attack, were twice repulsed with considerable loss. Mahomet
himself sat on horseback on the beach to encourage their valor by his
voice and presence, by the promise of reward, and by fear more potent
than the fear of the enemy. The passions of his soul, and even the
gestures of his body, ^45 seemed to imitate the actions of the
combatants; and, as if he had been the lord of nature, he spurred his
horse with a fearless and impotent effort into the sea. His loud
reproaches, and the clamors of the camp, urged the Ottomans to a third
attack, more fatal and bloody than the two former; and I must repeat,
though I cannot credit, the evidence of Phranza, who affirms, from their
own mouth, that they lost above twelve thousand men in the slaughter of
the day. They fled in disorder to the shores of Europe and Asia, while
the Christian squadron, triumphant and unhurt, steered along the
Bosphorus, and securely anchored within the chain of the harbor. In the
confidence of victory, they boasted that the whole Turkish power must
have yielded to their arms; but the admiral, or captain bashaw, found
some consolation for a painful wound in his eye, by representing that
accident as the cause of his defeat. Balthi Ogli was a renegade of the
race of the Bulgarian princes: his military character was tainted with
the unpopular vice of avarice; and under the despotism of the prince or
people, misfortune is a sufficient evidence of guilt. ^* His rank and
services were annihilated by the displeasure of Mahomet. In the royal
presence, the captain bashaw was extended on the ground by four slaves,
and received one hundred strokes with a golden rod: ^46 his death had
been pronounced; and he adored the clemency of the sultan, who was
satisfied with the milder punishment of confiscation and exile. The
introduction of this supply revived the hopes of the Greeks, and accused
the supineness of their Western allies. Amidst the deserts of Anatolia
and the rocks of Palestine, the millions of the crusades had buried
themselves in a voluntary and inevitable grave; but the situation of the
Imperial city was strong against her enemies, and accessible to her
friends; and a rational and moderate armament of the marine states might
have saved the relics of the Roman name, and maintained a Christian
fortress in the heart of the Ottoman empire. Yet this was the sole and
feeble attempt for the deliverance of Constantinople: the more distant
powers were insensible of its danger; and the ambassador of Hungary, or
at least of Huniades, resided in the Turkish camp, to remove the fears,
and to direct the operations, of the sultan. ^47

[Footnote 42: It is singular that the Greeks should not agree in the
number of these illustrious vessels; the fiveof Ducas, the fourof
Phranza and Leonardus, and the twoof Chalcondyles, must be extended to
the smaller, or confined to the larger, size. Voltaire, in giving one of
these ships to Frederic III., confounds the emperors of the East and
West.]

[Footnote 43: In bold defiance, or rather in gross ignorance, of
language and geography, the president Cousin detains them in Chios with
a south, and wafts them to Constantinople with a north, wind.]

[Footnote 44: The perpetual decay and weakness of the Turkish navy may
be observed in Ricaut, (State of the Ottoman Empire, p. 372--378,)
Thevenot, (Voyages, P. i. p. 229--242, and Tott, (Mémoires, tom. iii;)
the last of whom is always solicitous to amuse and amaze his reader.]

[Footnote 45: I must confess that I have before my eyes the living
picture which Thucydides (l. vii. c. 71) has drawn of the passions and
gestures of the Athenians in a naval engagement in the great harbor of
Syracuse.]

[Footnote *: According to Ducas, one of the Afabi beat out his eye with
a stone Compare Von Hammer. -- M.]

[Footnote 46: According to the exaggeration or corrupt text of Ducas,
(c. 38,) this golden bar was of the enormous or incredible weight of 500
libræ, or pounds. Bouillaud's reading of 500 drachms, or five pounds, is
sufficient to exercise the arm of Mahomet, and bruise the back of his
admiral.]

[Footnote 47: Ducas, who confesses himself ill informed of the affairs
of Hungary assigns a motive of superstition, a fatal belief that
Constantinople would be the term of the Turkish conquests. See Phranza
(l. iii. c. 20) and Spondanus.]

It was difficult for the Greeks to penetrate the secret of the divan;
yet the Greeks are persuaded, that a resistance so obstinate and
surprising, had fatigued the perseverance of Mahomet. He began to
meditate a retreat; and the siege would have been speedily raised, if
the ambition and jealousy of the second vizier had not opposed the
perfidious advice of Calil Bashaw, who still maintained a secret
correspondence with the Byzantine court. The reduction of the city
appeared to be hopeless, unless a double attack could be made from the
harbor as well as from the land; but the harbor was inaccessible: an
impenetrable chain was now defended by eight large ships, more than
twenty of a smaller size, with several galleys and sloops; and, instead
of forcing this barrier, the Turks might apprehend a naval sally, and a
second encounter in the open sea. In this perplexity, the genius of
Mahomet conceived and executed a plan of a bold and marvellous cast, of
transporting by land his lighter vessels and military stores from the
Bosphorus into the higher part of the harbor. The distance is about ten
^* miles; the ground is uneven, and was overspread with thickets; and,
as the road must be opened behind the suburb of Galata, their free
passage or total destruction must depend on the option of the Genoese.
But these selfish merchants were ambitious of the favor of being the
last devoured; and the deficiency of art was supplied by the strength of
obedient myriads. A level way was covered with a broad platform of
strong and solid planks; and to render them more slippery and smooth,
they were anointed with the fat of sheep and oxen. Fourscore light
galleys and brigantines, of fifty and thirty oars, were disembarked on
the Bosphorus shore; arranged successively on rollers; and drawn
forwards by the power of men and pulleys. Two guides or pilots were
stationed at the helm, and the prow, of each vessel: the sails were
unfurled to the winds; and the labor was cheered by song and
acclamation. In the course of a single night, this Turkish fleet
painfully climbed the hill, steered over the plain, and was launched
from the declivity into the shallow waters of the harbor, far above the
molestation of the deeper vessels of the Greeks. The real importance of
this operation was magnified by the consternation and confidence which
it inspired: but the notorious, unquestionable fact was displayed before
the eyes, and is recorded by the pens, of the two nations. ^48 A similar
stratagem had been repeatedly practised by the ancients; ^49 the Ottoman
galleys (I must again repeat) should be considered as large boats; and,
if we compare the magnitude and the distance, the obstacles and the
means, the boasted miracle ^50 has perhaps been equalled by the industry
of our own times. ^51 As soon as Mahomet had occupied the upper harbor
with a fleet and army, he constructed, in the narrowest part, a bridge,
or rather mole, of fifty cubits in breadth, and one hundred in length:
it was formed of casks and hogsheads; joined with rafters, linked with
iron, and covered with a solid floor. On this floating battery he
planted one of his largest cannon, while the fourscore galleys, with
troops and scaling ladders, approached the most accessible side, which
had formerly been stormed by the Latin conquerors. The indolence of the
Christians has been accused for not destroying these unfinished works;
^! but their fire, by a superior fire, was controlled and silenced; nor
were they wanting in a nocturnal attempt to burn the vessels as well as
the bridge of the sultan. His vigilance prevented their approach; their
foremost galiots were sunk or taken; forty youths, the bravest of Italy
and Greece, were inhumanly massacred at his command; nor could the
emperor's grief be assuaged by the just though cruel retaliation, of
exposing from the walls the heads of two hundred and sixty Mussulman
captives. After a siege of forty days, the fate of Constantinople could
no longer be averted. The diminutive garrison was exhausted by a double
attack: the fortifications, which had stood for ages against hostile
violence, were dismantled on all sides by the Ottoman cannon: many
breaches were opened; and near the gate of St. Romanus, four towers had
been levelled with the ground. For the payment of his feeble and
mutinous troops, Constantine was compelled to despoil the churches with
the promise of a fourfold restitution; and his sacrilege offered a new
reproach to the enemies of the union. A spirit of discord impaired the
remnant of the Christian strength; the Genoese and Venetian auxiliaries
asserted the preeminence of their respective service; and Justiniani and
the great duke, whose ambition was not extinguished by the common
danger, accused each other of treachery and cowardice.

[Footnote *: Six miles. Von Hammer. -- M.]?

[Footnote 48: The unanimous testimony of the four Greeks is confirmed by
Cantemir (p. 96) from the Turkish annals; but I could wish to contract
the distance of ten* miles, and to prolong the term of onenight.

Note: * Six miles. Von Hammer. -- M.]

[Footnote 49: Phranza relates two examples of a similar transportation
over the six miles of the Isthmus of Corinth; the one fabulous, of
Augustus after the battle of Actium; the other true, of Nicetas, a Greek
general in the xth century. To these he might have added a bold
enterprise of Hannibal, to introduce his vessels into the harbor of
Tarentum, (Polybius, l. viii. p. 749, edit. Gronov. *)

Note: * Von Hammer gives a longer list of such transportations, p. 533.
Dion Cassius distinctly relates the occurrence treated as fabulous by
Gibbon. -- M.]

[Footnote 50: A Greek of Candia, who had served the Venetians in a
similar undertaking, (Spond. A.D. 1438, No. 37,) might possibly be the
adviser and agent of Mahomet.]

[Footnote 51: I particularly allude to our own embarkations on the lakes
of Canada in the years 1776 and 1777, so great in the labor, so
fruitless in the event.]

[Footnote !: They were betrayed, according to some accounts, by the
Genoese of Galata. Von Hammer, p. 536. -- M.]

During the siege of Constantinople, the words of peace and capitulation
had been sometimes pronounced; and several embassies had passed between
the camp and the city. ^52 The Greek emperor was humbled by adversity;
and would have yielded to any terms compatible with religion and
royalty. The Turkish sultan was desirous of sparing the blood of his
soldiers; still more desirous of securing for his own use the Byzantine
treasures: and he accomplished a sacred duty in presenting to the
Gaboursthe choice of circumcision, of tribute, or of death. The avarice
of Mahomet might have been satisfied with an annual sum of one hundred
thousand ducats; but his ambition grasped the capital of the East: to
the prince he offered a rich equivalent, to the people a free
toleration, or a safe departure: but after some fruitless treaty, he
declared his resolution of finding either a throne, or a grave, under
the walls of Constantinople. A sense of honor, and the fear of universal
reproach, forbade Palæologus to resign the city into the hands of the
Ottomans; and he determined to abide the last extremities of war.
Several days were employed by the sultan in the preparations of the
assault; and a respite was granted by his favorite science of astrology,
which had fixed on the twenty-ninth of May, as the fortunate and fatal
hour. On the evening of the twenty-seventh, he issued his final orders;
assembled in his presence the military chiefs, and dispersed his heralds
through the camp to proclaim the duty, and the motives, of the perilous
enterprise. Fear is the first principle of a despotic government; and
his menaces were expressed in the Oriental style, that the fugitives and
deserters, had they the wings of a bird, ^53 should not escape from his
inexorable justice. The greatest part of his bashaws and Janizaries were
the offspring of Christian parents: but the glories of the Turkish name
were perpetuated by successive adoption; and in the gradual change of
individuals, the spirit of a legion, a regiment, or an oda, is kept
alive by imitation and discipline. In this holy warfare, the Moslems
were exhorted to purify their minds with prayer, their bodies with seven
ablutions; and to abstain from food till the close of the ensuing day. A
crowd of dervises visited the tents, to instil the desire of martyrdom,
and the assurance of spending an immortal youth amidst the rivers and
gardens of paradise, and in the embraces of the black-eyed virgins. Yet
Mahomet principally trusted to the efficacy of temporal and visible
rewards. A double pay was promised to the victorious troops: "The city
and the buildings," said Mahomet, "are mine; but I resign to your valor
the captives and the spoil, the treasures of gold and beauty; be rich
and be happy. Many are the provinces of my empire: the intrepid soldier
who first ascends the walls of Constantinople shall be rewarded with the
government of the fairest and most wealthy; and my gratitude shall
accumulate his honors and fortunes above the measure of his own hopes."
Such various and potent motives diffused among the Turks a general
ardor, regardless of life and impatient for action: the camp reechoed
with the Moslem shouts of "God is God: there is but one God, and Mahomet
is the apostle of God;" ^54 and the sea and land, from Galata to the
seven towers, were illuminated by the blaze of their nocturnal fires. ^*

[Footnote 52: Chalcondyles and Ducas differ in the time and
circumstances of the negotiation; and as it was neither glorious nor
salutary, the faithful Phranza spares his prince even the thought of a
surrender.]

[Footnote 53: These wings (Chalcondyles, l. viii. p. 208) are no more
than an Oriental figure: but in the tragedy of Irene, Mahomet's passion
soars above sense and reason: --

Should the fierce North, upon his frozen wings.

Bear him aloft above the wondering clouds,

And seat him in the Pleiads' golden chariot --

Then should my fury drag him down to tortures.

Besides the extravagance of the rant, I must observe, 1. That the
operation of the winds must be confined to the lowerregion of the air.
2. That the name, etymology, and fable of the Pleiads are purely Greek,
(Scholiast ad Homer, S. 686. Eudocia in Ioniâ, p. 399. Apollodor. l.
iii. c. 10. Heyne, p. 229, Not. 682,) and had no affinity with the
astronomy of the East, (Hyde ad Ulugbeg, Tabul. in Syntagma Dissert.
tom. i. p. 40, 42. Goguet, Origine des Arts, &c., tom. vi. p. 73--78.
Gebelin, Hist. du Calendrier, p. 73,) which Mahomet had studied. 3. The
golden chariot does not exist either in science or fiction; but I much
fear Dr. Johnson has confounded the Pleiads with the great bear or
wagon, the zodiac with a northern constellation: --

''Ark-on q' hn kai amaxan epiklhsin kaleouein. Il. S. 487.

11]

[Footnote 54: Phranza quarrels with these Moslem acclamations, not for
the name of God, but for that of the prophet: the pious zeal of Voltaire
is excessive, and even ridiculous.]

[Footnote *: The picture is heightened by the addition of the wailing
cries of Kyris, which were heard from the dark interior of the city. Von
Hammer p. 539. -- M.]

Far different was the state of the Christians; who, with loud and
impotent complaints, deplored the guilt, or the punishment, of their
sins. The celestial image of the Virgin had been exposed in solemn
procession; but their divine patroness was deaf to their entreaties:
they accused the obstinacy of the emperor for refusing a timely
surrender; anticipated the horrors of their fate; and sighed for the
repose and security of Turkish servitude. The noblest of the Greeks, and
the bravest of the allies, were summoned to the palace, to prepare them,
on the evening of the twenty-eighth, for the duties and dangers of the
general assault. The last speech of Palæologus was the funeral oration
of the Roman empire: ^55 he promised, he conjured, and he vainly
attempted to infuse the hope which was extinguished in his own mind. In
this world all was comfortless and gloomy; and neither the gospel nor
the church have proposed any conspicuous recompense to the heroes who
fall in the service of their country. But the example of their prince,
and the confinement of a siege, had armed these warriors with the
courage of despair, and the pathetic scene is described by the feelings
of the historian Phranza, who was himself present at this mournful
assembly. They wept, they embraced; regardless of their families and
fortunes, they devoted their lives; and each commander, departing to his
station, maintained all night a vigilant and anxious watch on the
rampart. The emperor, and some faithful companions, entered the dome of
St. Sophia, which in a few hours was to be converted into a mosque; and
devoutly received, with tears and prayers, the sacrament of the holy
communion. He reposed some moments in the palace, which resounded with
cries and lamentations; solicited the pardon of all whom he might have
injured; ^56 and mounted on horseback to visit the guards, and explore
the motions of the enemy. The distress and fall of the last Constantine
are more glorious than the long prosperity of the Byzantine Cæsars. ^*

[Footnote 55: I am afraid that this discourse was composed by Phranza
himself; and it smells so grossly of the sermon and the convent, that I
almost doubt whether it was pronounced by Constantine. Leonardus assigns
him another speech, in which he addresses himself more respectfully to
the Latin auxiliaries.]

[Footnote 56: This abasement, which devotion has sometimes extorted from
dying princes, is an improvement of the gospel doctrine of the
forgiveness of injuries: it is more easy to forgive 490 times, than once
to ask pardon of an inferior.]

[Footnote *: Compare the very curious Armenian elegy on the fall of
Constantinople, translated by M. Boré, in the Journal Asiatique for
March, 1835; and by M. Brosset, in the new edition of Le Beau, (tom.
xxi. p. 308.) The author thus ends his poem: "I, Abraham, loaded with
sins, have composed this elegy with the most lively sorrow; for I have
seen Constantinople in the days of its glory." -- M.]

In the confusion of darkness, an assailant may sometimes succeed; out in
this great and general attack, the military judgment and astrological
knowledge of Mahomet advised him to expect the morning, the memorable
twenty-ninth of May, in the fourteen hundred and fifty-third year of the
Christian æra. The preceding night had been strenuously employed: the
troops, the cannons, and the fascines, were advanced to the edge of the
ditch, which in many parts presented a smooth and level passage to the
breach; and his fourscore galleys almost touched, with the prows and
their scaling-ladders, the less defensible walls of the harbor. Under
pain of death, silence was enjoined: but the physical laws of motion and
sound are not obedient to discipline or fear; each individual might
suppress his voice and measure his footsteps; but the march and labor of
thousands must inevitably produce a strange confusion of dissonant
clamors, which reached the ears of the watchmen of the towers. At
daybreak, without the customary signal of the morning gun, the Turks
assaulted the city by sea and land; and the similitude of a twined or
twisted thread has been applied to the closeness and continuity of their
line of attack. ^57 The foremost ranks consisted of the refuse of the
host, a voluntary crowd who fought without order or command; of the
feebleness of age or childhood, of peasants and vagrants, and of all who
had joined the camp in the blind hope of plunder and martyrdom. The
common impulse drove them onwards to the wall; the most audacious to
climb were instantly precipitated; and not a dart, not a bullet, of the
Christians, was idly wasted on the accumulated throng. But their
strength and ammunition were exhausted in this laborious defence: the
ditch was filled with the bodies of the slain; they supported the
footsteps of their companions; and of this devoted vanguard the death
was more serviceable than the life. Under their respective bashaws and
sanjaks, the troops of Anatolia and Romania were successively led to the
charge: their progress was various and doubtful; but, after a conflict
of two hours, the Greeks still maintained, and improved their advantage;
and the voice of the emperor was heard, encouraging his soldiers to
achieve, by a last effort, the deliverance of their country. In that
fatal moment, the Janizaries arose, fresh, vigorous, and invincible. The
sultan himself on horseback, with an iron mace in his hand, was the
spectator and judge of their valor: he was surrounded by ten thousand of
his domestic troops, whom he reserved for the decisive occasion; and the
tide of battle was directed and impelled by his voice and eye. His
numerous ministers of justice were posted behind the line, to urge, to
restrain, and to punish; and if danger was in the front, shame and
inevitable death were in the rear, of the fugitives. The cries of fear
and of pain were drowned in the martial music of drums, trumpets, and
attaballs; and experience has proved, that the mechanical operation of
sounds, by quickening the circulation of the blood and spirits, will act
on the human machine more forcibly than the eloquence of reason and
honor. From the lines, the galleys, and the bridge, the Ottoman
artillery thundered on all sides; and the camp and city, the Greeks and
the Turks, were involved in a cloud of smoke which could only be
dispelled by the final deliverance or destruction of the Roman empire.
The single combats of the heroes of history or fable amuse our fancy and
engage our affections: the skilful evolutions of war may inform the
mind, and improve a necessary, though pernicious, science. But in the
uniform and odious pictures of a general assault, all is blood, and
horror, and confusion nor shall I strive, at the distance of three
centuries, and a thousand miles, to delineate a scene of which there
could be no spectators, and of which the actors themselves were
incapable of forming any just or adequate idea.

[Footnote 57: Besides the 10,000 guards, and the sailors and the
marines, Ducas numbers in this general assault 250,000 Turks, both horse
and foot.]

The immediate loss of Constantinople may be ascribed to the bullet, or
arrow, which pierced the gauntlet of John Justiniani. The sight of his
blood, and the exquisite pain, appalled the courage of the chief, whose
arms and counsels were the firmest rampart of the city. As he withdrew
from his station in quest of a surgeon, his flight was perceived and
stopped by the indefatigable emperor. "Your wound," exclaimed
Palæologus, "is slight; the danger is pressing: your presence is
necessary; and whither will you retire?" -- "I will retire," said the
trembling Genoese, "by the same road which God has opened to the Turks;"
and at these words he hastily passed through one of the breaches of the
inner wall. By this pusillanimous act he stained the honors of a
military life; and the few days which he survived in Galata, or the Isle
of Chios, were embittered by his own and the public reproach. ^58 His
example was imitated by the greatest part of the Latin auxiliaries, and
the defence began to slacken when the attack was pressed with redoubled
vigor. The number of the Ottomans was fifty, perhaps a hundred, times
superior to that of the Christians; the double walls were reduced by the
cannon to a heap of ruins: in a circuit of several miles, some places
must be found more easy of access, or more feebly guarded; and if the
besiegers could penetrate in a single point, the whole city was
irrecoverably lost. The first who deserved the sultan's reward was
Hassan the Janizary, of gigantic stature and strength. With his cimeter
in one hand and his buckler in the other, he ascended the outward
fortification: of the thirty Janizaries, who were emulous of his valor,
eighteen perished in the bold adventure. Hassan and his twelve
companions had reached the summit: the giant was precipitated from the
rampart: he rose on one knee, and was again oppressed by a shower of
darts and stones. But his success had proved that the achievement was
possible: the walls and towers were instantly covered with a swarm of
Turks; and the Greeks, now driven from the vantage ground, were
overwhelmed by increasing multitudes. Amidst these multitudes, the
emperor, ^59 who accomplished all the duties of a general and a soldier,
was long seen and finally lost. The nobles, who fought round his person,
sustained, till their last breath, the honorable names of Palæologus and
Cantacuzene: his mournful exclamation was heard, "Cannot there be found
a Christian to cut off my head?" ^60 and his last fear was that of
falling alive into the hands of the infidels. ^61 The prudent despair of
Constantine cast away the purple: amidst the tumult he fell by an
unknown hand, and his body was buried under a mountain of the slain.
After his death, resistance and order were no more: the Greeks fled
towards the city; and many were pressed and stifled in the narrow pass
of the gate of St. Romanus. The victorious Turks rushed through the
breaches of the inner wall; and as they advanced into the streets, they
were soon joined by their brethren, who had forced the gate Phenar on
the side of the harbor. ^62 In the first heat of the pursuit, about two
thousand Christians were put to the sword; but avarice soon prevailed
over cruelty; and the victors acknowledged, that they should immediately
have given quarter if the valor of the emperor and his chosen bands had
not prepared them for a similar opposition in every part of the capital.
It was thus, after a siege of fifty-three days, that Constantinople,
which had defied the power of Chosroes, the Chagan, and the caliphs, was
irretrievably subdued by the arms of Mahomet the Second. Her empire only
had been subverted by the Latins: her religion was trampled in the dust
by the Moslem conquerors. ^63

[Footnote 58: In the severe censure of the flight of Justiniani, Phranza
expresses his own feelings and those of the public. For some private
reasons, he is treated with more lenity and respect by Ducas; but the
words of Leonardus Chiensis express his strong and recent indignation,
gloriæsalutis suique oblitus. In the whole series of their Eastern
policy, his countrymen, the Genoese, were always suspected, and often
guilty. *

Note: * M. Brosset has given some extracts from the Georgian account of
the siege of Constantinople, in which Justiniani's wound in the left
foot is represented as more serious. With charitable ambiguity the
chronicler adds that his soldiers carried him away with them in their
vessel. -- M.]

[Footnote 59: Ducas kills him with two blows of Turkish soldiers;
Chalcondyles wounds him in the shoulder, and then tramples him in the
gate. The grief of Phranza, carrying him among the enemy, escapes from
the precise image of his death; but we may, without flattery, apply
these noble lines of Dryden: --

As to Sebastian, let them search the field;

And where they find a mountain of the slain,

Send one to climb, and looking down beneath,

There they will find him at his manly length,

With his face up to heaven, in that red monument

Which his good sword had digged.

11]

[Footnote 60: Spondanus, (A.D. 1453, No. 10,) who has hopes of his
salvation, wishes to absolve this demand from the guilt of suicide.]

[Footnote 61: Leonardus Chiensis very properly observes, that the Turks,
had they known the emperor, would have labored to save and secure a
captive so acceptable to the sultan.]

[Footnote 62: Cantemir, p. 96. The Christian ships in the mouth of the
harbor had flanked and retarded this naval attack.]

[Footnote 63: Chalcondyles most absurdly supposes, that Constantinople
was sacked by the Asiatics in revenge for the ancient calamities of
Troy; and the grammarians of the xvth century are happy to melt down the
uncouth appellation of Turks into the more classical name of Teucri.]

The tidings of misfortune fly with a rapid wing; yet such was the extent
of Constantinople, that the more distant quarters might prolong, some
moments, the happy ignorance of their ruin. ^64 But in the general
consternation, in the feelings of selfish or social anxiety, in the
tumult and thunder of the assault, a sleeplessnight and morning ^* must
have elapsed; nor can I believe that many Grecian ladies were awakened
by the Janizaries from a sound and tranquil slumber. On the assurance of
the public calamity, the houses and convents were instantly deserted;
and the trembling inhabitants flocked together in the streets, like a
herd of timid animals, as if accumulated weakness could be productive of
strength, or in the vain hope, that amid the crowd each individual might
be safe and invisible. From every part of the capital, they flowed into
the church of St. Sophia: in the space of an hour, the sanctuary, the
choir, the nave, the upper and lower galleries, were filled with the
multitudes of fathers and husbands, of women and children, of priests,
monks, and religious virgins: the doors were barred on the inside, and
they sought protection from the sacred dome, which they had so lately
abhorred as a profane and polluted edifice. Their confidence was founded
on the prophecy of an enthusiast or impostor; that one day the Turks
would enter Constantinople, and pursue the Romans as far as the column
of Constantine in the square before St. Sophia: but that this would be
the term of their calamities: that an angel would descend from heaven,
with a sword in his hand, and would deliver the empire, with that
celestial weapon, to a poor man seated at the foot of the column. "Take
this sword," would he say, "and avenge the people of the Lord." At these
animating words, the Turks would instantly fly, and the victorious
Romans would drive them from the West, and from all Anatolia as far as
the frontiers of Persia. It is on this occasion that Ducas, with some
fancy and much truth, upbraids the discord and obstinacy of the Greeks.
"Had that angel appeared," exclaims the historian, "had he offered to
exterminate your foes if you would consent to the union of the church,
even event then, in that fatal moment, you would have rejected your
safety, or have deceived your God." ^65

[Footnote 64: When Cyrus suppressed Babylon during the celebration of a
festival, so vast was the city, and so careless were the inhabitants,
that much time elapsed before the distant quarters knew that they were
captives. Herodotus, (l. i. c. 191,) and Usher, (Annal. p. 78,) who has
quoted from the prophet Jeremiah a passage of similar import.]

[Footnote *: This refers to an expression in Ducas, who, to heighten the
effect of his description, speaks of the "sweet morning sleep resting on
the eyes of youths and maidens," p. 288. Edit. Bekker. -- M.]

[Footnote 65: This lively description is extracted from Ducas, (c. 39,)
who two years afterwards was sent ambassador from the prince of Lesbos
to the sultan, (c. 44.) Till Lesbos was subdued in 1463, (Phranza, l.
iii. c. 27,) that island must have been full of the fugitives of
Constantinople, who delighted to repeat, perhaps to adorn, the tale of
their misery.]

Chapter LXVIII: Reign Of Mahomet The Second, Extinction Of Eastern
Empire. -- Part IV.

While they expected the descent of the tardy angel, the doors were
broken with axes; and as the Turks encountered no resistance, their
bloodless hands were employed in selecting and securing the multitude of
their prisoners. Youth, beauty, and the appearance of wealth, attracted
their choice; and the right of property was decided among themselves by
a prior seizure, by personal strength, and by the authority of command.
In the space of an hour, the male captives were bound with cords, the
females with their veils and girdles. The senators were linked with
their slaves; the prelates, with the porters of the church; and young
men of the plebeian class, with noble maids, whose faces had been
invisible to the sun and their nearest kindred. In this common
captivity, the ranks of society were confounded; the ties of nature were
cut asunder; and the inexorable soldier was careless of the father's
groans, the tears of the mother, and the lamentations of the children.
The loudest in their wailings were the nuns, who were torn from the
altar with naked bosoms, outstretched hands, and dishevelled hair; and
we should piously believe that few could be tempted to prefer the vigils
of the harem to those of the monastery. Of these unfortunate Greeks, of
these domestic animals, whole strings were rudely driven through the
streets; and as the conquerors were eager to return for more prey, their
trembling pace was quickened with menaces and blows. At the same hour, a
similar rapine was exercised in all the churches and monasteries, in all
the palaces and habitations, of the capital; nor could any place,
however sacred or sequestered, protect the persons or the property of
the Greeks. Above sixty thousand of this devoted people were transported
from the city to the camp and fleet; exchanged or sold according to the
caprice or interest of their masters, and dispersed in remote servitude
through the provinces of the Ottoman empire. Among these we may notice
some remarkable characters. The historian Phranza, first chamberlain and
principal secretary, was involved with his family in the common lot.
After suffering four months the hardships of slavery, he recovered his
freedom: in the ensuing winter he ventured to Adrianople, and ransomed
his wife from the mir bashi, or master of the horse; but his two
children, in the flower of youth and beauty, had been seized for the use
of Mahomet himself. The daughter of Phranza died in the seraglio,
perhaps a virgin: his son, in the fifteenth year of his age, preferred
death to infamy, and was stabbed by the hand of the royal lover. ^66 A
deed thus inhuman cannot surely be expiated by the taste and liberality
with which he released a Grecian matron and her two daughters, on
receiving a Latin doe From ode from Philelphus, who had chosen a wife in
that noble family. ^67 The pride or cruelty of Mahomet would have been
most sensibly gratified by the capture of a Roman legate; but the
dexterity of Cardinal Isidore eluded the search, and he escaped from
Galata in a plebeian habit. ^68 The chain and entrance of the outward
harbor was still occupied by the Italian ships of merchandise and war.
They had signalized their valor in the siege: they embraced the moment
of retreat, while the Turkish mariners were dissipated in the pillage of
the city. When they hoisted sail, the beach was covered with a suppliant
and lamentable crowd; but the means of transportation were scanty: the
Venetians and Genoese selected their countrymen; and, notwithstanding
the fairest promises of the sultan, the inhabitants of Galata evacuated
their houses, and embarked with their most precious effects.

[Footnote 66: See Phranza, l. iii. c. 20, 21. His expressions are
positive: Ameras suâmanûjugulavit . . . . volebat enim eo turpiter et
nefarie abuti. Me miserum et infelicem! Yet he could only learn from
report the bloody or impure scenes that were acted in the dark recesses
of the seraglio.]

[Footnote 67: See Tiraboschi (tom. vi. P. i. p. 290) and Lancelot, (Mém.
de l'Académie des Inscriptions, tom. x. p. 718.) I should be curious to
learn how he could praise the public enemy, whom he so often reviles as
the most corrupt and inhuman of tyrants.]

[Footnote 68: The commentaries of Pius II. suppose that he craftily
placed his cardinal's hat on the head of a corpse which was cut off and
exposed in triumph, while the legate himself was bought and delivered as
a captive of no value. The great Belgic Chronicle adorns his escape with
new adventures, which he suppressed (says Spondanus, A.D. 1453, No. 15)
in his own letters, lest he should lose the merit and reward of
suffering for Christ. *

Note: * He was sold as a slave in Galata, according to Von Hammer, p.
175. See the somewhat vague and declamatory letter of Cardinal Isidore,
in the appendix to Clarke's Travels, vol. ii. p. 653. -- M.]

In the fall and the sack of great cities, an historian is condemned to
repeat the tale of uniform calamity: the same effects must be produced
by the same passions; and when those passions may be indulged without
control, small, alas! is the difference between civilized and savage
man. Amidst the vague exclamations of bigotry and hatred, the Turks are
not accused of a wanton or immoderate effusion of Christian blood: but
according to their maxims, (the maxims of antiquity,) the lives of the
vanquished were forfeited; and the legitimate reward of the conqueror
was derived from the service, the sale, or the ransom, of his captives
of both sexes. ^69 The wealth of Constantinople had been granted by the
sultan to his victorious troops; and the rapine of an hour is more
productive than the industry of years. But as no regular division was
attempted of the spoil, the respective shares were not determined by
merit; and the rewards of valor were stolen away by the followers of the
camp, who had declined the toil and danger of the battle. The narrative
of their depredations could not afford either amusement or instruction:
the total amount, in the last poverty of the empire, has been valued at
four millions of ducats; ^70 and of this sum a small part was the
property of the Venetians, the Genoese, the Florentines, and the
merchants of Ancona. Of these foreigners, the stock was improved in
quick and perpetual circulation: but the riches of the Greeks were
displayed in the idle ostentation of palaces and wardrobes, or deeply
buried in treasures of ingots and old coin, lest it should be demanded
at their hands for the defence of their country. The profanation and
plunder of the monasteries and churches excited the most tragic
complaints. The dome of St. Sophia itself, the earthly heaven, the
second firmament, the vehicle of the cherubim, the throne of the glory
of God, ^71 was despoiled of the oblation of ages; and the gold and
silver, the pearls and jewels, the vases and sacerdotal ornaments, were
most wickedly converted to the service of mankind. After the divine
images had been stripped of all that could be valuable to a profane eye,
the canvas, or the wood, was torn, or broken, or burnt, or trod under
foot, or applied, in the stables or the kitchen, to the vilest uses. The
example of sacrilege was imitated, however, from the Latin conquerors of
Constantinople; and the treatment which Christ, the Virgin, and the
saints, had sustained from the guilty Catholic, might be inflicted by
the zealous Mussulman on the monuments of idolatry. Perhaps, instead of
joining the public clamor, a philosopher will observe, that in the
decline of the arts the workmanship could not be more valuable than the
work, and that a fresh supply of visions and miracles would speedily be
renewed by the craft of the priests and the credulity of the people. He
will more seriously deplore the loss of the Byzantine libraries, which
were destroyed or scattered in the general confusion: one hundred and
twenty thousand manuscripts are said to have disappeared; ^72 ten
volumes might be purchased for a single ducat; and the same ignominious
price, too high perhaps for a shelf of theology, included the whole
works of Aristotle and Homer, the noblest productions of the science and
literature of ancient Greece. We may reflect with pleasure that an
inestimable portion of our classic treasures was safely deposited in
Italy; and that the mechanics of a German town had invented an art which
derides the havoc of time and barbarism.

[Footnote 69: Busbequius expatiates with pleasure and applause on the
rights of war, and the use of slavery, among the ancients and the Turks,
(de Legat. Turcicâ, epist. iii. p. 161.)]

[Footnote 70: This sum is specified in a marginal note of Leunclavius,
(Chalcondyles, l. viii. p. 211,) but in the distribution to Venice,
Genoa, Florence, and Ancona, of 50, 20, and 15,000 ducats, I suspect
that a figure has been dropped. Even with the restitution, the foreign
property would scarcely exceed one fourth.]

[Footnote 71: See the enthusiastic praises and lamentations of Phranza,
(l. iii. c. 17.)]

[Footnote 72: See Ducas, (c. 43,) and an epistle, July 15th, 1453, from
Laurus Quirinus to Pope Nicholas V., (Hody de Græcis, p. 192, from a MS.
in the Cotton library.)]

From the first hour ^73 of the memorable twenty-ninth of May, disorder
and rapine prevailed in Constantinople, till the eighth hour of the same
day; when the sultan himself passed in triumph through the gate of St.
Romanus. He was attended by his viziers, bashaws, and guards, each of
whom (says a Byzantine historian) was robust as Hercules, dexterous as
Apollo, and equal in battle to any ten of the race of ordinary mortals.
The conqueror ^74 gazed with satisfaction and wonder on the strange,
though splendid, appearance of the domes and palaces, so dissimilar from
the style of Oriental architecture. In the hippodrome, or atmeidan, his
eye was attracted by the twisted column of the three serpents; and, as a
trial of his strength, he shattered with his iron mace or battle-axe the
under jaw of one of these monsters, ^75 which in the eyes of the Turks
were the idols or talismans of the city. ^* At the principal door of St.
Sophia, he alighted from his horse, and entered the dome; and such was
his jealous regard for that monument of his glory, that on observing a
zealous Mussulman in the act of breaking the marble pavement, he
admonished him with his cimeter, that, if the spoil and captives were
granted to the soldiers, the public and private buildings had been
reserved for the prince. By his command the metropolis of the Eastern
church was transformed into a mosque: the rich and portable instruments
of superstition had been removed; the crosses were thrown down; and the
walls, which were covered with images and mosaics, were washed and
purified, and restored to a state of naked simplicity. On the same day,
or on the ensuing Friday, the muezin, or crier, ascended the most lofty
turret, and proclaimed the ezan, or public invitation in the name of God
and his prophet; the imam preached; and Mahomet and Second performed the
namazof prayer and thanksgiving on the great altar, where the Christian
mysteries had so lately been celebrated before the last of the Cæsars.
^76 From St. Sophia he proceeded to the august, but desolate mansion of
a hundred successors of the great Constantine, but which in a few hours
had been stripped of the pomp of royalty. A melancholy reflection on the
vicissitudes of human greatness forced itself on his mind; and he
repeated an elegant distich of Persian poetry: "The spider has wove his
web in the Imperial palace; and the owl hath sung her watch-song on the
towers of Afrasiab." ^77

[Footnote 73: The Julian Calendar, which reckons the days and hours from
midnight, was used at Constantinople. But Ducas seems to understand the
natural hours from sunrise.]

[Footnote 74: See the Turkish Annals, p. 329, and the Pandects of
Leunclavius, p. 448.]

[Footnote 75: I have had occasion (vol. ii. p. 100) to mention this
curious relic of Grecian antiquity.]

[Footnote *: Von Hammer passes over this circumstance, which is treated
by Dr. Clarke (Travels, vol. ii. p. 58, 4to. edit,) as a fiction of
Thevenot. Chishull states that the monument was broken by some
attendants of the Polish ambassador. -- M.]

[Footnote 76: We are obliged to Cantemir (p. 102) for the Turkish
account of the conversion of St. Sophia, so bitterly deplored by Phranza
and Ducas. It is amusing enough to observe, in what opposite lights the
same object appears to a Mussulman and a Christian eye.]

[Footnote 77: This distich, which Cantemir gives in the original,
derives new beauties from the application. It was thus that Scipio
repeated, in the sack of Carthage, the famous prophecy of Homer. The
same generous feeling carried the mind of the conqueror to the past or
the future.]

Yet his mind was not satisfied, nor did the victory seem complete, till
he was informed of the fate of Constantine; whether he had escaped, or
been made prisoner, or had fallen in the battle. Two Janizaries claimed
the honor and reward of his death: the body, under a heap of slain, was
discovered by the golden eagles embroidered on his shoes; the Greeks
acknowledged, with tears, the head of their late emperor; and, after
exposing the bloody trophy, ^78 Mahomet bestowed on his rival the honors
of a decent funeral. After his decease, Lucas Notaras, great duke, ^79
and first minister of the empire, was the most important prisoner. When
he offered his person and his treasures at the foot of the throne, "And
why," said the indignant sultan, "did you not employ these treasures in
the defence of your prince and country?" -- "They were yours," answered
the slave; "God had reserved them for your hands." -- "If he reserved
them for me," replied the despot, "how have you presumed to withhold
them so long by a fruitless and fatal resistance?" The great duke
alleged the obstinacy of the strangers, and some secret encouragement
from the Turkish vizier; and from this perilous interview he was at
length dismissed with the assurance of pardon and protection. Mahomet
condescended to visit his wife, a venerable princess oppressed with
sickness and grief; and his consolation for her misfortunes was in the
most tender strain of humanity and filial reverence. A similar clemency
was extended to the principal officers of state, of whom several were
ransomed at his expense; and during some days he declared himself the
friend and father of the vanquished people. But the scene was soon
changed; and before his departure, the hippodrome streamed with the
blood of his noblest captives. His perfidious cruelty is execrated by
the Christians: they adorn with the colors of heroic martyrdom the
execution of the great duke and his two sons; and his death is ascribed
to the generous refusal of delivering his children to the tyrant's lust.
^* Yet a Byzantine historian has dropped an unguarded word of
conspiracy, deliverance, and Italian succor: such treason may be
glorious; but the rebel who bravely ventures, has justly forfeited his
life; nor should we blame a conqueror for destroying the enemies whom he
can no longer trust. On the eighteenth of June the victorious sultan
returned to Adrianople; and smiled at the base and hollow embassies of
the Christian princes, who viewed their approaching ruin in the fall of
the Eastern empire.

[Footnote 78: I cannot believe with Ducas (see Spondanus, A.D. 1453, No.
13) that Mahomet sent round Persia, Arabia, &c., the head of the Greek
emperor: he would surely content himself with a trophy less inhuman.]

[Footnote 79: Phranza was the personal enemy of the great duke; nor
could time, or death, or his own retreat to a monastery, extort a
feeling of sympathy or forgiveness. Ducas is inclined to praise and pity
the martyr; Chalcondyles is neuter, but we are indebted to him for the
hint of the Greek conspiracy.]

[Footnote *: Von Hammer relates this undoubtingly, apparently on good
authority, p. 559. -- M.]

Constantinople had been left naked and desolate, without a prince or a
people. But she could not be despoiled of the incomparable situation
which marks her for the metropolis of a great empire; and the genius of
the place will ever triumph over the accidents of time and fortune.
Boursa and Adrianople, the ancient seats of the Ottomans, sunk into
provincial towns; and Mahomet the Second established his own residence,
and that of his successors, on the same commanding spot which had been
chosen by Constantine. ^80 The fortifications of Galata, which might
afford a shelter to the Latins, were prudently destroyed; but the damage
of the Turkish cannon was soon repaired; and before the month of August,
great quantities of lime had been burnt for the restoration of the walls
of the capital. As the entire property of the soil and buildings,
whether public or private, or profane or sacred, was now transferred to
the conqueror, he first separated a space of eight furlongs from the
point of the triangle for the establishment of his seraglio or palace.
It is here, in the bosom of luxury, that the Grand Signor(as he has been
emphatically named by the Italians) appears to reign over Europe and
Asia; but his person on the shores of the Bosphorus may not always be
secure from the insults of a hostile navy. In the new character of a
mosque, the cathedral of St. Sophia was endowed with an ample revenue,
crowned with lofty minarets, and surrounded with groves and fountains,
for the devotion and refreshment of the Moslems. The same model was
imitated in the jami, or royal mosques; and the first of these was
built, by Mahomet himself, on the ruins of the church of the holy
apostles, and the tombs of the Greek emperors. On the third day after
the conquest, the grave of Abu Ayub, or Job, who had fallen in the first
siege of the Arabs, was revealed in a vision; and it is before the
sepulchre of the martyr that the new sultans are girded with the sword
of empire. ^81 Constantinople no longer appertains to the Roman
historian; nor shall I enumerate the civil and religious edifices that
were profaned or erected by its Turkish masters: the population was
speedily renewed; and before the end of September, five thousand
families of Anatolia and Romania had obeyed the royal mandate, which
enjoined them, under pain of death, to occupy their new habitations in
the capital. The throne of Mahomet was guarded by the numbers and
fidelity of his Moslem subjects: but his rational policy aspired to
collect the remnant of the Greeks; and they returned in crowds, as soon
as they were assured of their lives, their liberties, and the free
exercise of their religion. In the election and investiture of a
patriarch, the ceremonial of the Byzantine court was revived and
imitated. With a mixture of satisfaction and horror, they beheld the
sultan on his throne; who delivered into the hands of Gennadius the
crosier or pastoral staff, the symbol of his ecclesiastical office; who
conducted the patriarch to the gate of the seraglio, presented him with
a horse richly caparisoned, and directed the viziers and bashaws to lead
him to the palace which had been allotted for his residence. ^82 The
churches of Constantinople were shared between the two religions: their
limits were marked; and, till it was infringed by Selim, the grandson of
Mahomet, the Greeks ^83 enjoyed above sixty years the benefit of this
equal partition. Encouraged by the ministers of the divan, who wished to
elude the fanaticism of the sultan, the Christian advocates presumed to
allege that this division had been an act, not of generosity, but of
justice; not a concession, but a compact; and that if one half of the
city had been taken by storm, the other moiety had surrendered on the
faith of a sacred capitulation. The original grant had indeed been
consumed by fire: but the loss was supplied by the testimony of three
aged Janizaries who remembered the transaction; and their venal oaths
are of more weight in the opinion of Cantemir, than the positive and
unanimous consent of the history of the times. ^84

[Footnote 80: For the restitution of Constantinople and the Turkish
foundations, see Cantemir, (p. 102--109,) Ducas, (c. 42,) with Thevenot,
Tournefort, and the rest of our modern travellers. From a gigantic
picture of the greatness, population, &c., of Constantinople and the
Ottoman empire, (Abrégéde l'Histoire Ottomane, tom. i. p. 16--21,) we
may learn, that in the year 1586 the Moslems were less numerous in the
capital than the Christians, or even the Jews.]

[Footnote 81: The Turbé, or sepulchral monument of Abu Ayub, is
described and engraved in the Tableau Générale de l'Empire Ottoman,
(Paris 1787, in large folio,) a work of less use, perhaps, than
magnificence, (tom. i. p. 305, 306.)]

[Footnote 82: Phranza (l. iii. c. 19) relates the ceremony, which has
possibly been adorned in the Greek reports to each other, and to the
Latins. The fact is confirmed by Emanuel Malaxus, who wrote, in vulgar
Greek, the History of the Patriarchs after the taking of Constantinople,
inserted in the Turco-Græcia of Crusius, (l. v. p. 106--184.) But the
most patient reader will not believe that Mahomet adopted the Catholic
form, "Sancta Trinitas quæmihi donavit imperium te in patriarcham
novæRomædeligit."]

[Footnote 83: From the Turco-Græcia of Crusius, &c. Spondanus (A.D.
1453, No. 21, 1458, No. 16) describes the slavery and domestic quarrels
of the Greek church. The patriarch who succeeded Gennadius threw himself
in despair into a well.]

[Footnote 84: Cantemir (p. 101--105) insists on the unanimous consent of
the Turkish historians, ancient as well as modern, and argues, that they
would not have violated the truth to diminish their national glory,
since it is esteemed more honorable to take a city by force than by
composition. But, 1. I doubt this consent, since he quotes no particular
historian, and the Turkish Annals of Leunclavius affirm, without
exception, that Mahomet took Constantinople per vim, (p. 329.) 2 The
same argument may be turned in favor of the Greeks of the times, who
would not have forgotten this honorable and salutary treaty. Voltaire,
as usual, prefers the Turks to the Christians.]

The remaining fragments of the Greek kingdom in Europe and Asia I shall
abandon to the Turkish arms; but the final extinction of the two last
dynasties ^85 which have reigned in Constantinople should terminate the
decline and fall of the Roman empire in the East. The despots of the
Morea, Demetrius and Thomas, ^86 the two surviving brothers of the name
of Palæologus, were astonished by the death of the emperor Constantine,
and the ruin of the monarchy. Hopeless of defence, they prepared, with
the noble Greeks who adhered to their fortune, to seek a refuge in
Italy, beyond the reach of the Ottoman thunder. Their first
apprehensions were dispelled by the victorious sultan, who contented
himself with a tribute of twelve thousand ducats; and while his ambition
explored the continent and the islands, in search of prey, he indulged
the Morea in a respite of seven years. But this respite was a period of
grief, discord, and misery. The hexamilion, the rampart of the Isthmus,
so often raised and so often subverted, could not long be defended by
three hundred Italian archers: the keys of Corinth were seized by the
Turks: they returned from their summer excursions with a train of
captives and spoil; and the complaints of the injured Greeks were heard
with indifference and disdain. The Albanians, a vagrant tribe of
shepherds and robbers, filled the peninsula with rapine and murder: the
two despots implored the dangerous and humiliating aid of a neighboring
bashaw; and when he had quelled the revolt, his lessons inculcated the
rule of their future conduct. Neither the ties of blood, nor the oaths
which they repeatedly pledged in the communion and before the altar, nor
the stronger pressure of necessity, could reconcile or suspend their
domestic quarrels. They ravaged each other's patrimony with fire and
sword: the alms and succors of the West were consumed in civil
hostility; and their power was only exerted in savage and arbitrary
executions. The distress and revenge of the weaker rival invoked their
supreme lord; and, in the season of maturity and revenge, Mahomet
declared himself the friend of Demetrius, and marched into the Morea
with an irresistible force. When he had taken possession of Sparta, "You
are too weak," said the sultan, "to control this turbulent province: I
will take your daughter to my bed; and you shall pass the remainder of
your life in security and honor." Demetrius sighed and obeyed;
surrendered his daughter and his castles; followed to Adrianople his
sovereign and his son; and received for his own maintenance, and that of
his followers, a city in Thrace and the adjacent isles of Imbros,
Lemnos, and Samothrace. He was joined the next year by a companion ^* of
misfortune, the last of the Comnenian race, who, after the taking of
Constantinople by the Latins, had founded a new empire on the coast of
the Black Sea. ^87 In the progress of his Anatolian conquest, Mahomet
invested with a fleet and army the capital of David, who presumed to
style himself emperor of Trebizond; ^88 and the negotiation was
comprised in a short and peremptory question, "Will you secure your life
and treasures by resigning your kingdom? or had you rather forfeit your
kingdom, your treasures, and your life?" The feeble Comnenus was subdued
by his own fears, ^! and the example of a Mussulman neighbor, the prince
of Sinope, ^89 who, on a similar summons, had yielded a fortified city,
with four hundred cannon and ten or twelve thousand soldiers. The
capitulation of Trebizond was faithfully performed: ^* and the emperor,
with his family, was transported to a castle in Romania; but on a slight
suspicion of corresponding with the Persian king, David, and the whole
Comnenian race, were sacrificed to the jealousy or avarice of the
conqueror. ^!! Nor could the name of father long protect the unfortunate
Demetrius from exile and confiscation; his abject submission moved the
pity and contempt of the sultan; his followers were transplanted to
Constantinople; and his poverty was alleviated by a pension of fifty
thousand aspers, till a monastic habit and a tardy death released
Palæologus from an earthly master. It is not easy to pronounce whether
the servitude of Demetrius, or the exile of his brother Thomas, ^90 be
the most inglorious. On the conquest of the Morea, the despot escaped to
Corfu, and from thence to Italy, with some naked adherents: his name,
his sufferings, and the head of the apostle St. Andrew, entitled him to
the hospitality of the Vatican; and his misery was prolonged by a
pension of six thousand ducats from the pope and cardinals. His two
sons, Andrew and Manuel, were educated in Italy; but the eldest,
contemptible to his enemies and burdensome to his friends, was degraded
by the baseness of his life and marriage. A title was his sole
inheritance; and that inheritance he successively sold to the kings of
France and Arragon. ^91 During his transient prosperity, Charles the
Eighth was ambitious of joining the empire of the East with the kingdom
of Naples: in a public festival, he assumed the appellation and the
purple of Augustus: the Greeks rejoiced and the Ottoman already
trembled, at the approach of the French chivalry. ^92 Manuel Palæologus,
the second son, was tempted to revisit his native country: his return
might be grateful, and could not be dangerous, to the Porte: he was
maintained at Constantinople in safety and ease; and an honorable train
of Christians and Moslems attended him to the grave. If there be some
animals of so generous a nature that they refuse to propagate in a
domestic state, the last of the Imperial race must be ascribed to an
inferior kind: he accepted from the sultan's liberality two beautiful
females; and his surviving son was lost in the habit and religion of a
Turkish slave.

[Footnote 85: For the genealogy and fall of the Comneni of Trebizond,
see Ducange, (Fam. Byzant. p. 195;) for the last Palæologi, the same
accurate antiquarian, (p. 244, 247, 248.) The Palæologi of Montferrat
were not extinct till the next century; but they had forgotten their
Greek origin and kindred.]

[Footnote 86: In the worthless story of the disputes and misfortunes of
the two brothers, Phranza (l. iii. c. 21--30) is too partial on the side
of Thomas Ducas (c. 44, 45) is too brief, and Chalcondyles (l. viii. ix.
x.) too diffuse and digressive.]

[Footnote *: Kalo-Johannes, the predecessor of David his brother, the
last emperor of Trebizond, had attempted to organize a confederacy
against Mahomet it comprehended Hassan Bei, sultan of Mesopotamia, the
Christian princes of Georgia and Iberia, the emir of Sinope, and the
sultan of Caramania. The negotiations were interrupted by his sudden
death, A.D. 1458. Fallmerayer, p. 257--260. -- M.]

[Footnote 87: See the loss or conquest of Trebizond in Chalcondyles, (l.
ix. p. 263--266,) Ducas, (c. 45,) Phranza, (l. iii. c. 27,) and
Cantemir, (p. 107.)]

[Footnote 88: Though Tournefort (tom. iii. lettre xvii. p. 179) speaks
of Trebizond as mal peuplée, Peysonnel, the latest and most accurate
observer, can find 100,000 inhabitants, (Commerce de la Mer Noire, tom.
ii. p. 72, and for the province, p. 53--90.) Its prosperity and trade
are perpetually disturbed by the factious quarrels of two odasof
Janizaries, in one which 30,000 Lazi are commonly enrolled, (Mémoires de
Tott, tom. iii. p. 16, 17.)]

[Footnote !: According to the Georgian account of these transactions,
(translated by M. Brosset, additions to Le Beau, vol. xxi. p. 325,) the
emperor of Trebizond humbly entreated the sultan to have the goodness to
marry one of his daughters. -- M.]

[Footnote 89: Ismael Beg, prince of Sinope or Sinople, was possessed
(chiefly from his copper mines) of a revenue of 200,000 ducats,
(Chalcond. l. ix. p. 258, 259.) Peysonnel (Commerce de la Mer Noire,
tom. ii. p. 100) ascribes to the modern city 60,000 inhabitants. This
account seems enormous; yet it is by trading with people that we become
acquainted with their wealth and numbers.]

[Footnote *: M. Boissonade has published, in the fifth volume of his
Anecdota Græca (p. 387, 401.) a very interesting letter from George
Amiroutzes, protovestiarius of Trebizond, to Bessarion, describing the
surrender of Trebizond, and the fate of its chief inhabitants. -- M.]

[Footnote !!: See in Von Hammer, vol. ii. p. 60, the striking account of
the mother, the empress Helena the Cantacuzene, who, in defiance of the
edict, like that of Creon in the Greek tragedy, dug the grave for her
murdered children with her own hand, and sank into it herself. -- M.]

[Footnote 90: Spondanus (from Gobelin Comment. Pii II. l. v.) relates
the arrival and reception of the despot Thomas at Rome,. (A.D. 1461 No.
NO. 3.)]

[Footnote 91: By an act dated A.D. 1494, Sept. 6, and lately transmitted
from the archives of the Capitol to the royal library of Paris, the
despot Andrew Palæologus, reserving the Morea, and stipulating some
private advantages, conveys to Charles VIII., king of France, the
empires of Constantinople and Trebizond, (Spondanus, A.D. 1495, No. 2.)
M. D. Foncemagne (Mém. de l'Académie des Inscriptions, tom. xvii. p.
539--578) has bestowed a dissertation on his national title, of which he
had obtained a copy from Rome.]

[Footnote 92: See Philippe de Comines, (l. vii. c. 14,) who reckons with
pleasure the number of Greeks who were prepared to rise, 60 miles of an
easy navigation, eighteen days' journey from Valona to Constantinople,
&c. On this occasion the Turkish empire was saved by the policy of
Venice.]

The importance of Constantinople was felt and magnified in its loss: the
pontificate of Nicholas the Fifth, however peaceful and prosperous, was
dishonored by the fall of the Eastern empire; and the grief and terror
of the Latins revived, or seemed to revive, the old enthusiasm of the
crusades. In one of the most distant countries of the West, Philip duke
of Burgundy entertained, at Lisle in Flanders, an assembly of his
nobles; and the pompous pageants of the feast were skilfully adapted to
their fancy and feelings. ^93 In the midst of the banquet a gigantic
Saracen entered the hall, leading a fictitious elephant with a castle on
his back: a matron in a mourning robe, the symbol of religion, was seen
to issue from the castle: she deplored her oppression, and accused the
slowness of her champions: the principal herald of the golden fleece
advanced, bearing on his fist a live pheasant, which, according to the
rites of chivalry, he presented to the duke. At this extraordinary
summons, Philip, a wise and aged prince, engaged his person and powers
in the holy war against the Turks: his example was imitated by the
barons and knights of the assembly: they swore to God, the Virgin, the
ladies and the pheasant; and their particular vows were not less
extravagant than the general sanction of their oath. But the performance
was made to depend on some future and foreign contingency; and during
twelve years, till the last hour of his life, the duke of Burgundy might
be scrupulously, and perhaps sincerely, on the eve of his departure. Had
every breast glowed with the same ardor; had the union of the Christians
corresponded with their bravery; had every country, from Sweden ^94 to
Naples, supplied a just proportion of cavalry and infantry, of men and
money, it is indeed probable that Constantinople would have been
delivered, and that the Turks might have been chased beyond the
Hellespont or the Euphrates. But the secretary of the emperor, who
composed every epistle, and attended every meeting, Æneas Sylvius, ^95 a
statesman and orator, describes from his own experience the repugnant
state and spirit of Christendom. "It is a body," says he, "without a
head; a republic without laws or magistrates. The pope and the emperor
may shine as lofty titles, as splendid images; but theyare unable to
command, and none are willing to obey: every state has a separate
prince, and every prince has a separate interest. What eloquence could
unite so many discordant and hostile powers under the same standard?
Could they be assembled in arms, who would dare to assume the office of
general? What order could be maintained? -- what military discipline?
Who would undertake to feed such an enormous multitude? Who would
understand their various languages, or direct their stranger and
incompatible manners? What mortal could reconcile the English with the
French, Genoa with Arragon the Germans with the natives of Hungary and
Bohemia? If a small number enlisted in the holy war, they must be
overthrown by the infidels; if many, by their own weight and confusion."
Yet the same Æneas, when he was raised to the papal throne, under the
name of Pius the Second, devoted his life to the prosecution of the
Turkish war. In the council of Mantua he excited some sparks of a false
or feeble enthusiasm; but when the pontiff appeared at Ancona, to embark
in person with the troops, engagements vanished in excuses; a precise
day was adjourned to an indefinite term; and his effective army
consisted of some German pilgrims, whom he was obliged to disband with
indulgences and arms. Regardless of futurity, his successors and the
powers of Italy were involved in the schemes of present and domestic
ambition; and the distance or proximity of each object determined in
their eyes its apparent magnitude. A more enlarged view of their
interest would have taught them to maintain a defensive and naval war
against the common enemy; and the support of Scanderbeg and his brave
Albanians might have prevented the subsequent invasion of the kingdom of
Naples. The siege and sack of Otranto by the Turks diffused a general
consternation; and Pope Sixtus was preparing to fly beyond the Alps,
when the storm was instantly dispelled by the death of Mahomet the
Second, in the fifty-first year of his age. ^96 His lofty genius aspired
to the conquest of Italy: he was possessed of a strong city and a
capacious harbor; and the same reign might have been decorated with the
trophies of the New and the Ancient Rome. ^97

[Footnote 93: See the original feast in Olivier de la Marche, (Mémoires,
P. i. c. 29, 30,) with the abstract and observations of M. de Ste.
Palaye, (Mémoires sur la Chevalerie, tom. i. P. iii. p. 182--185.) The
peacock and the pheasant were distinguished as royal birds.]

[Footnote 94: It was found by an actual enumeration, that Sweden,
Gothland, and Finland, contained 1,800,000 fighting men, and
consequently were far more populous than at present.]

[Footnote 95: In the year 1454, Spondanus has given, from Æneas Sylvius,
a view of the state of Europe, enriched with his own observations. That
valuable annalist, and the Italian Muratori, will continue the series of
events from the year 1453 to 1481, the end of Mahomet's life, and of
this chapter.]

[Footnote 96: Besides the two annalists, the reader may consult Giannone
(Istoria Civile, tom. iii. p. 449--455) for the Turkish invasion of the
kingdom of Naples. For the reign and conquests of Mahomet II., I have
occasionally used the Memorie Istoriche de Monarchi Ottomanni di
Giovanni Sagredo, (Venezia, 1677, in 4to.) In peace and war, the Turks
have ever engaged the attention of the republic of Venice. All her
despatches and archives were open to a procurator of St. Mark, and
Sagredo is not contemptible either in sense or style. Yet he too
bitterly hates the infidels: he is ignorant of their language and
manners; and his narrative, which allows only 70 pages to Mahomet II.,
(p. 69--140,) becomes more copious and authentic as he approaches the
years 1640 and 1644, the term of the historic labors of John Sagredo.]

[Footnote 97: As I am now taking an everlasting farewell of the Greek
empire, I shall briefly mention the great collection of Byzantine
writers whose names and testimonies have been successively repeated in
this work. The Greeks presses of Aldus and the Italians were confined to
the classics of a better age; and the first rude editions of Procopius,
Agathias, Cedrenus, Zonaras, &c., were published by the learned
diligence of the Germans. The whole Byzantine series (xxxvi. volumes in
folio) has gradually issued (A.D. 1648, &c.) from the royal press of the
Louvre, with some collateral aid from Rome and Leipsic; but the Venetian
edition, (A.D. 1729,) though cheaper and more copious, is not less
inferior in correctness than in magnificence to that of Paris. The
merits of the French editors are various; but the value of Anna Comnena,
Cinnamus, Villehardouin, &c., is enhanced by the historical notes of
Charles de Fresne du Cange. His supplemental works, the Greek Glossary,
the Constantinopolis Christiana, the FamiliæByzantinæ, diffuse a steady
light over the darkness of the Lower Empire. *

Note: * The new edition of the Byzantines, projected by Niebuhr, and
continued under the patronage of the Prussian government, is the most
convenient in size, and contains some authors (Leo Diaconus, Johannes
Lydus, Corippus, the new fragment of Dexippus, Eunapius, &c., discovered
by Mai) which could not be comprised in the former collections; but the
names of such editors as Bekker, the Dindorfs, &c., raised hopes of
something more than the mere republication of the text, and the notes of
former editors. Little, I regret to say, has been added of annotation,
and in some cases, the old incorrect versions have been retained. -- M.]

Chapter LXIX: State Of Rome From The Twelfth Century.Part I.

State Of Rome From The Twelfth Century. -- Temporal Dominion Of The
Popes. -- Seditions Of The City. -- Political Heresy Of Arnold Of
Brescia. -- Restoration Of The Republic. -- The Senators. -- Pride Of
The Romans. -- Their Wars. -- They Are Deprived Of The Election And
Presence Of The Popes, Who Retire To Avignon. -- The Jubilee. -- Noble
Families Of Rome. -- Feud Of The Colonna And Ursini.

In the first ages of the decline and fall of the Roman empire, our eye
is invariably fixed on the royal city, which had given laws to the
fairest portion of the globe. We contemplate her fortunes, at first with
admiration, at length with pity, always with attention, and when that
attention is diverted from the capital to the provinces, they are
considered as so many branches which have been successively severed from
the Imperial trunk. The foundation of a second Rome, on the shores of
the Bosphorus, has compelled the historian to follow the successors of
Constantine; and our curiosity has been tempted to visit the most remote
countries of Europe and Asia, to explore the causes and the authors of
the long decay of the Byzantine monarchy. By the conquest of Justinian,
we have been recalled to the banks of the Tyber, to the deliverance of
the ancient metropolis; but that deliverance was a change, or perhaps an
aggravation, of servitude. Rome had been already stripped of her
trophies, her gods, and her Cæsars; nor was the Gothic dominion more
inglorious and oppressive than the tyranny of the Greeks. In the eighth
century of the Christian æra, a religious quarrel, the worship of
images, provoked the Romans to assert their independence: their bishop
became the temporal, as well as the spiritual, father of a free people;
and of the Western empire, which was restored by Charlemagne, the title
and image still decorate the singular constitution of modern Germany.
The name of Rome must yet command our involuntary respect: the climate
(whatsoever may be its influence) was no longer the same: ^1 the purity
of blood had been contaminated through a thousand channels; but the
venerable aspect of her ruins, and the memory of past greatness,
rekindled a spark of the national character. The darkness of the middle
ages exhibits some scenes not unworthy of our notice. Nor shall I
dismiss the present work till I have reviewed the state and revolutions
of the Roman City, which acquiesced under the absolute dominion of the
popes, about the same time that Constantinople was enslaved by the
Turkish arms.

[Footnote 1: The abbéDubos, who, with less genius than his successor
Montesquieu, has asserted and magnified the influence of climate,
objects to himself the degeneracy of the Romans and Batavians. To the
first of these examples he replies, 1. That the change is less real than
apparent, and that the modern Romans prudently conceal in themselves the
virtues of their ancestors. 2. That the air, the soil, and the climate
of Rome have suffered a great and visible alteration, (Réflexions sur la
Poësie et sur la Peinture, part ii. sect. 16.) *

Note: * This question is discussed at considerable length in Dr.
Arnold's History of Rome, ch. xxiii. See likewise Bunsen's Dissertation
on the Aria Cattiva Roms Beschreibung, pp. 82, 108. -- M.]

In the beginning of the twelfth century, ^2 the æra of the first
crusade, Rome was revered by the Latins, as the metropolis of the world,
as the throne of the pope and the emperor, who, from the eternal city,
derived their title, their honors, and the right or exercise of temporal
dominion. After so long an interruption, it may not be useless to repeat
that the successors of Charlemagne and the Othos were chosen beyond the
Rhine in a national diet; but that these princes were content with the
humble names of kings of Germany and Italy, till they had passed the
Alps and the Apennine, to seek their Imperial crown on the banks of the
Tyber. ^3 At some distance from the city, their approach was saluted by
a long procession of the clergy and people with palms and crosses; and
the terrific emblems of wolves and lions, of dragons and eagles, that
floated in the military banners, represented the departed legions and
cohorts of the republic. The royal path to maintain the liberties of
Rome was thrice reiterated, at the bridge, the gate, and on the stairs
of the Vatican; and the distribution of a customary donative feebly
imitated the magnificence of the first Cæsars. In the church of St.
Peter, the coronation was performed by his successor: the voice of God
was confounded with that of the people; and the public consent was
declared in the acclamations of "Long life and victory to our lord the
pope! long life and victory to our lord the emperor! long life and
victory to the Roman and Teutonic armies!" ^4 The names of Cæsar and
Augustus, the laws of Constantine and Justinian, the example of
Charlemagne and Otho, established the supreme dominion of the emperors:
their title and image was engraved on the papal coins; ^5 and their
jurisdiction was marked by the sword of justice, which they delivered to
the præfect of the city. But every Roman prejudice was awakened by the
name, the language, and the manners, of a Barbarian lord. The Cæsars of
Saxony or Franconia were the chiefs of a feudal aristocracy; nor could
they exercise the discipline of civil and military power, which alone
secures the obedience of a distant people, impatient of servitude,
though perhaps incapable of freedom. Once, and once only, in his life,
each emperor, with an army of Teutonic vassals, descended from the Alps.
I have described the peaceful order of his entry and coronation; but
that order was commonly disturbed by the clamor and sedition of the
Romans, who encountered their sovereign as a foreign invader: his
departure was always speedy, and often shameful; and, in the absence of
a long reign, his authority was insulted, and his name was forgotten.
The progress of independence in Germany and Italy undermined the
foundations of the Imperial sovereignty, and the triumph of the popes
was the deliverance of Rome.

[Footnote 2: The reader has been so long absent from Rome, that I would
advise him to recollect or review the xlixth chapter of this History.]

[Footnote 3: The coronation of the German emperors at Rome, more
especially in the xith century, is best represented from the original
monuments by Muratori (Antiquitat. ItaliæMedii Ævi, tom. i. dissertat.
ii. p. 99, &c.) and Cenni, (Monument. Domin. Pontif. tom. ii. diss. vi.
p. 261,) the latter of whom I only know from the copious extract of
Schmidt, (Hist. des Allemands tom. iii. p. 255--266.)]

[Footnote 4: Exercitui Romano et Teutonico! The latter was both seen and
felt; but the former was no more than magni nominis umbra.]

[Footnote 5: Muratori has given the series of the papal coins,
(Antiquitat. tom. ii. diss. xxvii. p. 548--554.) He finds only two more
early than the year 800: fifty are still extant from Leo III. to Leo
IX., with the addition of the reigning emperor none remain of Gregory
VII. or Urban II.; but in those of Paschal II. he seems to have
renounced this badge of dependence.]

Of her two sovereigns, the emperor had precariously reigned by the right
of conquest; but the authority of the pope was founded on the soft,
though more solid, basis of opinion and habit. The removal of a foreign
influence restored and endeared the shepherd to his flock. Instead of
the arbitrary or venal nomination of a German court, the vicar of Christ
was freely chosen by the college of cardinals, most of whom were either
natives or inhabitants of the city. The applause of the magistrates and
people confirmed his election, and the ecclesiastical power that was
obeyed in Sweden and Britain had been ultimately derived from the
suffrage of the Romans. The same suffrage gave a prince, as well as a
pontiff, to the capital. It was universally believed, that Constantine
had invested the popes with the temporal dominion of Rome; and the
boldest civilians, the most profane skeptics, were satisfied with
disputing the right of the emperor and the validity of his gift. The
truth of the fact, the authenticity of his donation, was deeply rooted
in the ignorance and tradition of four centuries; and the fabulous
origin was lost in the real and permanent effects. The name of Dominusor
Lord was inscribed on the coin of the bishops: their title was
acknowledged by acclamations and oaths of allegiance, and with the free,
or reluctant, consent of the German Cæsars, they had long exercised a
supreme or subordinate jurisdiction over the city and patrimony of St.
Peter. The reign of the popes, which gratified the prejudices, was not
incompatible with the liberties, of Rome; and a more critical inquiry
would have revealed a still nobler source of their power; the gratitude
of a nation, whom they had rescued from the heresy and oppression of the
Greek tyrant. In an age of superstition, it should seem that the union
of the royal and sacerdotal characters would mutually fortify each
other; and that the keys of Paradise would be the surest pledge of
earthly obedience. The sanctity of the office might indeed be degraded
by the personal vices of the man. But the scandals of the tenth century
were obliterated by the austere and more dangerous virtues of Gregory
the Seventh and his successors; and in the ambitious contests which they
maintained for the rights of the church, their sufferings or their
success must equally tend to increase the popular veneration. They
sometimes wandered in poverty and exile, the victims of persecution; and
the apostolic zeal with which they offered themselves to martyrdom must
engage the favor and sympathy of every Catholic breast. And sometimes,
thundering from the Vatican, they created, judged, and deposed the kings
of the world; nor could the proudest Roman be disgraced by submitting to
a priest, whose feet were kissed, and whose stirrup was held, by the
successors of Charlemagne. ^6 Even the temporal interest of the city
should have protected in peace and honor the residence of the popes;
from whence a vain and lazy people derived the greatest part of their
subsistence and riches. The fixed revenue of the popes was probably
impaired; many of the old patrimonial estates, both in Italy and the
provinces, had been invaded by sacrilegious hands; nor could the loss be
compensated by the claim, rather than the possession, of the more ample
gifts of Pepin and his descendants. But the Vatican and Capitol were
nourished by the incessant and increasing swarms of pilgrims and
suppliants: the pale of Christianity was enlarged, and the pope and
cardinals were overwhelmed by the judgment of ecclesiastical and secular
causes. A new jurisprudence had established in the Latin church the
right and practice of appeals; ^7 and from the North and West the
bishops and abbots were invited or summoned to solicit, to complain, to
accuse, or to justify, before the threshold of the apostles. A rare
prodigy is once recorded, that two horses, belonging to the archbishops
of Mentz and Cologne, repassed the Alps, yet laden with gold and silver:
^8 but it was soon understood, that the success, both of the pilgrims
and clients, depended much less on the justice of their cause than on
the value of their offering. The wealth and piety of these strangers
were ostentatiously displayed; and their expenses, sacred or profane,
circulated in various channels for the emolument of the Romans.

[Footnote 6: See Ducange, Gloss. mediæet infimæLatinitat. tom. vi. p.
364, 365, Staffa. This homage was paid by kings to archbishops, and by
vassals to their lords, (Schmidt, tom. iii. p. 262;) and it was the
nicest policy of Rome to confound the marks of filial and of feudal
subjection.]

[Footnote 7: The appeals from all the churches to the Roman pontiff are
deplored by the zeal of St. Bernard (de Consideratione, l. iii. tom. ii.
p. 431--442, edit. Mabillon, Venet. 1750) and the judgment of Fleury,
(Discours sur l'Hist. Ecclésiastique, iv. et vii.) But the saint, who
believed in the false decretals condemns only the abuse of these
appeals; the more enlightened historian investigates the origin, and
rejects the principles, of this new jurisprudence.]

[Footnote 8: Germanici . . . . summarii non levatis sarcinis onusti
nihilominus repatriant inviti. Nova res! quando hactenus aurum Roma
refudit? Et nunc Romanorum consilio id usurpatum non credimus, (Bernard,
de Consideratione, l. iii. c. 3, p. 437.) The first words of the passage
are obscure, and probably corrupt.]

Such powerful motives should have firmly attached the voluntary and
pious obedience of the Roman people to their spiritual and temporal
father. But the operation of prejudice and interest is often disturbed
by the sallies of ungovernable passion. The Indian who fells the tree,
that he may gather the fruit, ^9 and the Arab who plunders the caravans
of commerce, are actuated by the same impulse of savage nature, which
overlooks the future in the present, and relinquishes for momentary
rapine the long and secure possession of the most important blessings.
And it was thus, that the shrine of St. Peter was profaned by the
thoughtless Romans; who pillaged the offerings, and wounded the
pilgrims, without computing the number and value of similar visits,
which they prevented by their inhospitable sacrilege. Even the influence
of superstition is fluctuating and precarious; and the slave, whose
reason is subdued, will often be delivered by his avarice or pride. A
credulous devotion for the fables and oracles of the priesthood most
powerfully acts on the mind of a Barbarian; yet such a mind is the least
capable of preferring imagination to sense, of sacrificing to a distant
motive, to an invisible, perhaps an ideal, object, the appetites and
interests of the present world. In the vigor of health and youth, his
practice will perpetually contradict his belief; till the pressure of
age, or sickness, or calamity, awakens his terrors, and compels him to
satisfy the double debt of piety and remorse. I have already observed,
that the modern times of religious indifference are the most favorable
to the peace and security of the clergy. Under the reign of
superstition, they had much to hope from the ignorance, and much to fear
from the violence, of mankind. The wealth, whose constant increase must
have rendered them the sole proprietors of the earth, was alternately
bestowed by the repentant father and plundered by the rapacious son:
their persons were adored or violated; and the same idol, by the hands
of the same votaries, was placed on the altar, or trampled in the dust.
In the feudal system of Europe, arms were the title of distinction and
the measure of allegiance; and amidst their tumult, the still voice of
law and reason was seldom heard or obeyed. The turbulent Romans
disdained the yoke, and insulted the impotence, of their bishop: ^10 nor
would his education or character allow him to exercise, with decency or
effect, the power of the sword. The motives of his election and the
frailties of his life were exposed to their familiar observation; and
proximity must diminish the reverence which his name and his decrees
impressed on a barbarous world. This difference has not escaped the
notice of our philosophic historian: "Though the name and authority of
the court of Rome were so terrible in the remote countries of Europe,
which were sunk in profound ignorance, and were entirely unacquainted
with its character and conduct, the pope was so little revered at home,
that his inveterate enemies surrounded the gates of Rome itself, and
even controlled his government in that city; and the ambassadors, who,
from a distant extremity of Europe, carried to him the humble, or rather
abject, submissions of the greatest potentate of the age, found the
utmost difficulty to make their way to him, and to throw themselves at
his feet." ^11

[Footnote 9: Quand les sauvages de la Louisiane veulent avoir du fruit,
ils coupent l'arbre au pied et cueillent le fruit. Voila le gouvernement
despotique, (Esprit des Loix, l. v. c. 13;) and passion and ignorance
are always despotic.]

[Footnote 10: In a free conversation with his countryman Adrian IV.,
John of Salisbury accuses the avarice of the pope and clergy:
Provinciarum diripiunt spolia, ac si thesauros Crsi studeant reparare.
Sed recte cum eis agit Altissimus, quoniam et ipsi aliis et sæpe
vilissimis hominibus dati sunt in direptionem, (de Nugis Curialium, l.
vi. c. 24, p. 387.) In the next page, he blames the rashness and
infidelity of the Romans, whom their bishops vainly strove to conciliate
by gifts, instead of virtues. It is pity that this miscellaneous writer
has not given us less morality and erudition, and more pictures of
himself and the times.]

[Footnote 11: Hume's History of England, vol. i. p. 419. The same writer
has given us, from Fitz-Stephen, a singular act of cruelty perpetrated
on the clergy by Geoffrey, the father of Henry II. "When he was master
of Normandy, the chapter of Seez presumed, without his consent, to
proceed to the election of a bishop: upon which he ordered all of them,
with the bishop elect, to be castrated, and made all their testicles be
brought him in a platter." Of the pain and danger they might justly
complain; yet since they had vowed chastity he deprived them of a
superfluous treasure.]

Since the primitive times, the wealth of the popes was exposed to envy,
their powers to opposition, and their persons to violence. But the long
hostility of the mitre and the crown increased the numbers, and inflamed
the passions, of their enemies. The deadly factions of the Guelphs and
Ghibelines, so fatal to Italy, could never be embraced with truth or
constancy by the Romans, the subjects and adversaries both of the bishop
and emperor; but their support was solicited by both parties, and they
alternately displayed in their banners the keys of St. Peter and the
German eagle. Gregory the Seventh, who may be adored or detested as the
founder of the papal monarchy, was driven from Rome, and died in exile
at Salerno. Six-and-thirty of his successors, ^12 till their retreat to
Avignon, maintained an unequal contest with the Romans: their age and
dignity were often violated; and the churches, in the solemn rites of
religion, were polluted with sedition and murder. A repetition ^13 of
such capricious brutality, without connection or design, would be
tedious and disgusting; and I shall content myself with some events of
the twelfth century, which represent the state of the popes and the
city. On Holy Thursday, while Paschal officiated before the altar, he
was interrupted by the clamors of the multitude, who imperiously
demanded the confirmation of a favorite magistrate. His silence
exasperated their fury; his pious refusal to mingle the affairs of earth
and heaven was encountered with menaces, and oaths, that he should be
the cause and the witness of the public ruin. During the festival of
Easter, while the bishop and the clergy, barefooted and in procession,
visited the tombs of the martyrs, they were twice assaulted, at the
bridge of St. Angelo, and before the Capitol, with volleys of stones and
darts. The houses of his adherents were levelled with the ground:
Paschal escaped with difficulty and danger; he levied an army in the
patrimony of St. Peter; and his last days were embittered by suffering
and inflicting the calamities of civil war. The scenes that followed the
election of his successor Gelasius the Second were still more scandalous
to the church and city. Cencio Frangipani, ^14 a potent and factious
baron, burst into the assembly furious and in arms: the cardinals were
stripped, beaten, and trampled under foot; and he seized, without pity
or respect, the vicar of Christ by the throat. Gelasius was dragged by
the hair along the ground, buffeted with blows, wounded with spurs, and
bound with an iron chain in the house of his brutal tyrant. An
insurrection of the people delivered their bishop: the rival families
opposed the violence of the Frangipani; and Cencio, who sued for pardon,
repented of the failure, rather than of the guilt, of his enterprise.
Not many days had elapsed, when the pope was again assaulted at the
altar. While his friends and enemies were engaged in a bloody contest,
he escaped in his sacerdotal garments. In this unworthy flight, which
excited the compassion of the Roman matrons, his attendants were
scattered or unhorsed; and, in the fields behind the church of St.
Peter, his successor was found alone and half dead with fear and
fatigue. Shaking the dust from his feet, the apostlewithdrew from a city
in which his dignity was insulted and his person was endangered; and the
vanity of sacerdotal ambition is revealed in the involuntary confession,
that one emperor was more tolerable than twenty. ^15 These examples
might suffice; but I cannot forget the sufferings of two pontiffs of the
same age, the second and third of the name of Lucius. The former, as he
ascended in battle array to assault the Capitol, was struck on the
temple by a stone, and expired in a few days. The latter was severely
wounded in the person of his servants. In a civil commotion, several of
his priests had been made prisoners; and the inhuman Romans, reserving
one as a guide for his brethren, put out their eyes, crowned them with
ludicrous mitres, mounted them on asses with their faces towards the
tail, and extorted an oath, that, in this wretched condition, they
should offer themselves as a lesson to the head of the church. Hope or
fear, lassitude or remorse, the characters of the men, and the
circumstances of the times, might sometimes obtain an interval of peace
and obedience; and the pope was restored with joyful acclamations to the
Lateran or Vatican, from whence he had been driven with threats and
violence. But the root of mischief was deep and perennial; and a
momentary calm was preceded and followed by such tempests as had almost
sunk the bark of St. Peter. Rome continually presented the aspect of war
and discord: the churches and palaces were fortified and assaulted by
the factions and families; and, after giving peace to Europe, Calistus
the Second alone had resolution and power to prohibit the use of private
arms in the metropolis. Among the nations who revered the apostolic
throne, the tumults of Rome provoked a general indignation; and in a
letter to his disciple Eugenius the Third, St. Bernard, with the
sharpness of his wit and zeal, has stigmatized the vices of the
rebellious people. ^16 "Who is ignorant," says the monk of Clairvaux,
"of the vanity and arrogance of the Romans? a nation nursed in sedition,
untractable, and scorning to obey, unless they are too feeble to resist.
When they promise to serve, they aspire to reign; if they swear
allegiance, they watch the opportunity of revolt; yet they vent their
discontent in loud clamors, if your doors, or your counsels, are shut
against them. Dexterous in mischief, they have never learned the science
of doing good. Odious to earth and heaven, impious to God, seditious
among themselves, jealous of their neighbors, inhuman to strangers, they
love no one, by no one are they beloved; and while they wish to inspire
fear, they live in base and continual apprehension. They will not
submit; they know not how to govern faithless to their superiors,
intolerable to their equals, ungrateful to their benefactors, and alike
impudent in their demands and their refusals. Lofty in promise, poor in
execution; adulation and calumny, perfidy and treason, are the familiar
arts of their policy." Surely this dark portrait is not colored by the
pencil of Christian charity; ^17 yet the features, however harsh or
ugly, express a lively resemblance of the Roman of the twelfth century.
^18

[Footnote 12: From Leo IX. and Gregory VII. an authentic and
contemporary series of the lives of the popes by the cardinal of
Arragon, Pandulphus Pisanus, Bernard Guido, &c., is inserted in the
Italian Historians of Muratori, (tom. iii. P. i. p. 277--685,) and has
been always before my eyes.]

[Footnote 13: The dates of years in the contents may throughout his this
chapter be understood as tacit references to the Annals of Muratori, my
ordinary and excellent guide. He uses, and indeed quotes, with the
freedom of a master, his great collection of the Italian Historians, in
xxviii. volumes; and as that treasure is in my library, I have thought
it an amusement, if not a duty, to consult the originals.]

[Footnote 14: I cannot refrain from transcribing the high-colored words
of Pandulphus Pisanus, (p. 384.) Hoc audiens inimicus pacis atque
turbator jam fatus Centius Frajapane, more draconis immanissimi
sibilans, et ab imis pectoribus trahens longa suspiria, accinctus retro
gladio sine more cucurrit, valvas ac fores confregit. Ecclesiam
furibundus introiit, inde custode remoto papam per gulam accepit,
distraxit pugnis calcibusque percussit, et tanquam brutum animal intra
limen ecclesiæacriter calcaribus cruentavit; et latro tantum dominum per
capillos et brachia, Jesûbono interim dormiente, detraxit, ad domum
usque deduxit, inibi catenavit et inclusit.]

[Footnote 15: Ego coram Deo et Ecclesiâdico, si unquam possibile esset,
mallem unum imperatorem quam tot dominos, (Vit. Gelas. II. p. 398.)]

[Footnote 16: Quid tam notum seculis quam protervia et cervicositas
Romanorum? Gens insueta paci, tumultui assueta, gens immitis et
intractabilis usque adhuc, subdi nescia, nisi cum non valet resistere,
(de Considerat. l. iv. c. 2, p. 441.) The saint takes breath, and then
begins again: Hi, invisi terræet clo, utrique injecere manus, &c., (p.
443.)]

[Footnote 17: As a Roman citizen, Petrarch takes leave to observe, that
Bernard, though a saint, was a man; that he might be provoked by
resentment, and possibly repent of his hasty passion, &c. (Mémoires sur
la Vie de Pétrarque, tom. i. p. 330.)]

[Footnote 18: Baronius, in his index to the xiith volume of his Annals,
has found a fair and easy excuse. He makes two heads, of Romani
Catholiciand Schismatici: to the former he applies all the good, to the
latter all the evil, that is told of the city.]

The Jews had rejected the Christ when he appeared among them in a
plebeian character; and the Romans might plead their ignorance of his
vicar when he assumed the pomp and pride of a temporal sovereign. In the
busy age of the crusades, some sparks of curiosity and reason were
rekindled in the Western world: the heresy of Bulgaria, the Paulician
sect, was successfully transplanted into the soil of Italy and France;
the Gnostic visions were mingled with the simplicity of the gospel; and
the enemies of the clergy reconciled their passions with their
conscience, the desire of freedom with the profession of piety. ^19 The
trumpet of Roman liberty was first sounded by Arnold of Brescia, ^20
whose promotion in the church was confined to the lowest rank, and who
wore the monastic habit rather as a garb of poverty than as a uniform of
obedience. His adversaries could not deny the wit and eloquence which
they severely felt; they confess with reluctance the specious purity of
his morals; and his errors were recommended to the public by a mixture
of important and beneficial truths. In his theological studies, he had
been the disciple of the famous and unfortunate Abelard, ^21 who was
likewise involved in the suspicion of heresy: but the lover of Eloisa
was of a soft and flexible nature; and his ecclesiastic judges were
edified and disarmed by the humility of his repentance. From this
master, Arnold most probably imbibed some metaphysical definitions of
the Trinity, repugnant to the taste of the times: his ideas of baptism
and the eucharist are loosely censured; but a political heresy was the
source of his fame and misfortunes. He presumed to quote the declaration
of Christ, that his kingdom is not of this world: he boldly maintained,
that the sword and the sceptre were intrusted to the civil magistrate;
that temporal honors and possessions were lawfully vested in secular
persons; that the abbots, the bishops, and the pope himself, must
renounce either their state or their salvation; and that after the loss
of their revenues, the voluntary tithes and oblations of the faithful
would suffice, not indeed for luxury and avarice, but for a frugal life
in the exercise of spiritual labors. During a short time, the preacher
was revered as a patriot; and the discontent, or revolt, of Brescia
against her bishop, was the first fruits of his dangerous lessons. But
the favor of the people is less permanent than the resentment of the
priest; and after the heresy of Arnold had been condemned by Innocent
the Second, ^22 in the general council of the Lateran, the magistrates
themselves were urged by prejudice and fear to execute the sentence of
the church. Italy could no longer afford a refuge; and the disciple of
Abelard escaped beyond the Alps, till he found a safe and hospitable
shelter in Zurich, now the first of the Swiss cantons. From a Roman
station, ^23 a royal villa, a chapter of noble virgins, Zurich had
gradually increased to a free and flourishing city; where the appeals of
the Milanese were sometimes tried by the Imperial commissaries. ^24 In
an age less ripe for reformation, the precursor of Zuinglius was heard
with applause: a brave and simple people imbibed, and long retained, the
color of his opinions; and his art, or merit, seduced the bishop of
Constance, and even the pope's legate, who forgot, for his sake, the
interest of their master and their order. Their tardy zeal was quickened
by the fierce exhortations of St. Bernard; ^25 and the enemy of the
church was driven by persecution to the desperate measures of erecting
his standard in Rome itself, in the face of the successor of St. Peter.

[Footnote 19: The heresies of the xiith century may be found in Mosheim,
(Institut. Hist. Ecclés. p. 419--427,) who entertains a favorable
opinion of Arnold of Brescia. In the vth volume I have described the
sect of the Paulicians, and followed their migration from Armenia to
Thrace and Bulgaria, Italy and France.]

[Footnote 20: The original pictures of Arnold of Brescia are drawn by
Otho, bishop of Frisingen, (Chron. l. vii. c. 31, de Gestis Frederici I.
l. i. c. 27, l. ii. c. 21,) and in the iiid book of the Ligurinus, a
poem of Gunthur, who flourished A.D. 1200, in the monastery of Paris
near Basil, (Fabric. Bibliot. Latin. Med. et InfimæÆtatis, tom. iii. p.
174, 175.) The long passage that relates to Arnold is produced by
Guilliman, (de Rebus Helveticis, l. iii. c. 5, p. 108.) *

Note: * Compare Franke, Arnold von Brescia und seine Zeit. Zurich, 1828.
-- M.]

[Footnote 21: The wicked wit of Bayle was amused in composing, with much
levity and learning, the articles of Abelard, Foulkes, Heloise, in his
Dictionnaire Critique. The dispute of Abelard and St. Bernard, of
scholastic and positive divinity, is well understood by Mosheim,
(Institut. Hist. Ecclés. p. 412--415.)]

[Footnote 22:

---- Damnatus ab illo

Præsule, qui numeros vetitum contingere nostros

Nomen ad innocuâducit laudabile vitâ.

We may applaud the dexterity and correctness of Ligurinus, who turns the
unpoetical name of Innocent II. into a compliment.]

[Footnote 23: A Roman inscription of Statio Turicensis has been found at
Zurich, (D'Anville, Notice de l'ancienne Gaul, p. 642--644;) but it is
without sufficient warrant, that the city and canton have usurped, and
even monopolized, the names of Tigurum and Pagus Tigurinus.]

[Footnote 24: Guilliman (de Rebus Helveticis, l. iii. c. 5, p. 106)
recapitulates the donation (A.D. 833) of the emperor Lewis the Pious to
his daughter the abbess Hildegardis. Curtim nostram Turegum in
ducatûAlamanniæin pago Durgaugensi, with villages, woods, meadows,
waters, slaves, churches, &c.; a noble gift. Charles the Bald gave the
jus monetæ, the city was walled under Otho I., and the line of the
bishop of Frisingen,

Nobile Turegum multarum copia rerum,

is repeated with pleasure by the antiquaries of Zurich.]

[Footnote 25: Bernard, Epistol. cxcv. tom. i. p. 187--190. Amidst his
invectives he drops a precious acknowledgment, qui, utinam quam
sanæesset doctrinæquam districtæest vitæ. He owns that Arnold would be a
valuable acquisition for the church.]

Chapter LXIX: State Of Rome From The Twelfth Century. -- Part II.

Yet the courage of Arnold was not devoid of discretion: he was
protected, and had perhaps been invited, by the nobles and people; and
in the service of freedom, his eloquence thundered over the seven hills.
Blending in the same discourse the texts of Livy and St. Paul, uniting
the motives of gospel, and of classic, enthusiasm, he admonished the
Romans, how strangely their patience and the vices of the clergy had
degenerated from the primitive times of the church and the city. He
exhorted them to assert the inalienable rights of men and Christians; to
restore the laws and magistrates of the republic; to respect the nameof
the emperor; but to confine their shepherd to the spiritual government
of his flock. ^26 Nor could his spiritual government escape the censure
and control of the reformer; and the inferior clergy were taught by his
lessons to resist the cardinals, who had usurped a despotic command over
the twenty-eight regions or parishes of Rome. ^27 The revolution was not
accomplished without rapine and violence, the diffusion of blood and the
demolition of houses: the victorious faction was enriched with the
spoils of the clergy and the adverse nobles. Arnold of Brescia enjoyed,
or deplored, the effects of his mission: his reign continued above ten
years, while two popes, Innocent the Second and Anastasius the Fourth,
either trembled in the Vatican, or wandered as exiles in the adjacent
cities. They were succeeded by a more vigorous and fortunate pontiff.
Adrian the Fourth, ^28 the only Englishman who has ascended the throne
of St. Peter; and whose merit emerged from the mean condition of a monk,
and almost a beggar, in the monastery of St. Albans. On the first
provocation, of a cardinal killed or wounded in the streets, he cast an
interdict on the guilty people; and from Christmas to Easter, Rome was
deprived of the real or imaginary comforts of religious worship. The
Romans had despised their temporal prince: they submitted with grief and
terror to the censures of their spiritual father: their guilt was
expiated by penance, and the banishment of the seditious preacher was
the price of their absolution. But the revenge of Adrian was yet
unsatisfied, and the approaching coronation of Frederic Barbarossa was
fatal to the bold reformer, who had offended, though not in an equal
degree, the heads of the church and state. In their interview at
Viterbo, the pope represented to the emperor the furious, ungovernable
spirit of the Romans; the insults, the injuries, the fears, to which his
person and his clergy were continually exposed; and the pernicious
tendency of the heresy of Arnold, which must subvert the principles of
civil, as well as ecclesiastical, subordination. Frederic was convinced
by these arguments, or tempted by the desire of the Imperial crown: in
the balance of ambition, the innocence or life of an individual is of
small account; and their common enemy was sacrificed to a moment of
political concord. After his retreat from Rome, Arnold had been
protected by the viscounts of Campania, from whom he was extorted by the
power of Cæsar: the præfect of the city pronounced his sentence: the
martyr of freedom was burned alive in the presence of a careless and
ungrateful people; and his ashes were cast into the Tyber, lest the
heretics should collect and worship the relics of their master. ^29 The
clergy triumphed in his death: with his ashes, his sect was dispersed;
his memory still lived in the minds of the Romans. From his school they
had probably derived a new article of faith, that the metropolis of the
Catholic church is exempt from the penalties of excommunication and
interdict. Their bishops might argue, that the supreme jurisdiction,
which they exercised over kings and nations, more especially embraced
the city and diocese of the prince of the apostles. But they preached to
the winds, and the same principle that weakened the effect, must temper
the abuse, of the thunders of the Vatican.

[Footnote 26: He advised the Romans,

Consiliis armisque sua moderamina summa

Arbitrio tractare suo: nil juris in hâc re

Pontifici summo, modicum concedere regi

Suadebat populo. Sic læsâstultus utrâque

Majestate, reum geminæse fecerat aulæ.

Nor is the poetry of Gunther different from the prose of Otho.]

[Footnote 27: See Baronius (A.D. 1148, No. 38, 39) from the Vatican MSS.
He loudly condemns Arnold (A.D. 1141, No. 3) as the father of the
political heretics, whose influence then hurt him in France.]

[Footnote 28: The English reader may consult the Biographia Britannica,
Adrian IV.; but our own writers have added nothing to the fame or merits
of their countrymen.]

[Footnote 29: Besides the historian and poet already quoted, the last
adventures of Arnold are related by the biographer of Adrian IV.
(Muratori. Script. Rerum Ital. tom. iii. P. i. p. 441, 442.)]

The love of ancient freedom has encouraged a belief that as early as the
tenth century, in their first struggles against the Saxon Othos, the
commonwealth was vindicated and restored by the senate and people of
Rome; that two consuls were annually elected among the nobles, and that
ten or twelve plebeian magistrates revived the name and office of the
tribunes of the commons. ^30 But this venerable structure disappears
before the light of criticism. In the darkness of the middle ages, the
appellations of senators, of consuls, of the sons of consuls, may
sometimes be discovered. ^31 They were bestowed by the emperors, or
assumed by the most powerful citizens, to denote their rank, their
honors, ^32 and perhaps the claim of a pure and patrician descent: but
they float on the surface, without a series or a substance, the titles
of men, not the orders of government; ^33 and it is only from the year
of Christ one thousand one hundred and forty-four that the establishment
of the senate is dated, as a glorious æra, in the acts of the city. A
new constitution was hastily framed by private ambition or popular
enthusiasm; nor could Rome, in the twelfth century, produce an antiquary
to explain, or a legislator to restore, the harmony and proportions of
the ancient model. The assembly of a free, of an armed, people, will
ever speak in loud and weighty acclamations. But the regular
distribution of the thirty-five tribes, the nice balance of the wealth
and numbers of the centuries, the debates of the adverse orators, and
the slow operations of votes and ballots, could not easily be adapted by
a blind multitude, ignorant of the arts, and insensible of the benefits,
of legal government. It was proposed by Arnold to revive and
discriminate the equestrian order; but what could be the motive or
measure of such distinction? ^34 The pecuniary qualification of the
knights must have been reduced to the poverty of the times: those times
no longer required their civil functions of judges and farmers of the
revenue; and their primitive duty, their military service on horseback,
was more nobly supplied by feudal tenures and the spirit of chivalry.
The jurisprudence of the republic was useless and unknown: the nations
and families of Italy who lived under the Roman and Barbaric laws were
insensibly mingled in a common mass; and some faint tradition, some
imperfect fragments, preserved the memory of the Code and Pandects of
Justinian. With their liberty the Romans might doubtless have restored
the appellation and office of consuls; had they not disdained a title so
promiscuously adopted in the Italian cities, that it has finally settled
on the humble station of the agents of commerce in a foreign land. But
the rights of the tribunes, the formidable word that arrested the public
counsels, suppose or must produce a legitimate democracy. The old
patricians were the subjects, the modern barons the tyrants, of the
state; nor would the enemies of peace and order, who insulted the vicar
of Christ, have long respected the unarmed sanctity of a plebeian
magistrate. ^35

[Footnote 30: Ducange (Gloss. Latinitatis Mediæet InfimæÆtatis,
Decarchones, tom. ii. p. 726) gives me a quotation from Blondus, (Decad.
ii. l. ii.:) Duo consules ex nobilitate quotannis fiebant, qui ad
vetustum consulum exemplar summærerum præessent. And in Sigonius (de
Regno Italiæ, l. v. Opp. tom. ii. p. 400) I read of the consuls and
tribunes of the xth century. Both Blondus, and even Sigonius, too freely
copied the classic method of supplying from reason or fancy the
deficiency of records.]

[Footnote 31: In the panegyric of Berengarius (Muratori, Script. Rer.
Ital. tom. ii. P. i. p. 408) a Roman is mentioned as consulis natus in
the beginning of the xth century. Muratori (Dissert. v.) discovers, in
the years 952 and 956, Gratianus in Dei nomine consul et dux, Georgius
consul et dux; and in 1015, Romanus, brother of Gregory VIII., proudly,
but vaguely, styles himself consul et dux et omnium Roma norum senator.]

[Footnote 32: As late as the xth century, the Greek emperors conferred
on the dukes of Venice, Naples, Amalphi, &c., the title of upatoV or
consuls, (see Chron. Sagornini, passim;) and the successors of
Charlemagne would not abdicate any of their prerogative. But in general
the names of consuland senator, which may be found among the French and
Germans, signify no more than count and lord, (Signeur, Ducange
Glossar.) The monkish writers are often ambitious of fine classic
words.]

[Footnote 33: The most constitutional form is a diploma of Otho III.,
(A. D 998,) consulibus senatûs populique Romani; but the act is probably
spurious. At the coronation of Henry I., A.D. 1014, the historian
Dithmar (apud Muratori, Dissert. xxiii.) describes him, a senatoribus
duodecim vallatum, quorum sex rasi barbâ, alii prolixâ, mystice
incedebant cum baculis. The senate is mentioned in the panegyric of
Berengarius, (p. 406.)]

[Footnote 34: In ancient Rome the equestrian order was not ranked with
the senate and people as a third branch of the republic till the
consulship of Cicero, who assumes the merit of the establishment, (Plin.
Hist. Natur. xxxiii. 3. Beaufort, République Romaine, tom. i. p.
144--155.)]

[Footnote 35: The republican plan of Arnold of Brescia is thus stated by
Gunther: --

Quin etiam titulos urbis renovare vetustos;

Nomine plebeio secernere nomen equestre,

Jura tribunorum, sanctum reparare senatum,

Et senio fessas mutasque reponere leges.

Lapsa ruinosis, et adhuc pendentia muris

Reddere primævo Capitolia prisca nitori.

But of these reformations, some were no more than ideas, others no more
than words.]

In the revolution of the twelfth century, which gave a new existence and
æra to Rome, we may observe the real and important events that marked or
confirmed her political independence. I. The Capitoline hill, one of her
seven eminences, ^36 is about four hundred yards in length, and two
hundred in breadth. A flight of a hundred steps led to the summit of the
Tarpeian rock; and far steeper was the ascent before the declivities had
been smoothed and the precipices filled by the ruins of fallen edifices.
From the earliest ages, the Capitol had been used as a temple in peace,
a fortress in war: after the loss of the city, it maintained a siege
against the victorious Gauls, and the sanctuary of the empire was
occupied, assaulted, and burnt, in the civil wars of Vitellius and
Vespasian. ^37 The temples of Jupiter and his kindred deities had
crumbled into dust; their place was supplied by monasteries and houses;
and the solid walls, the long and shelving porticos, were decayed or
ruined by the lapse of time. It was the first act of the Romans, an act
of freedom, to restore the strength, though not the beauty, of the
Capitol; to fortify the seat of their arms and counsels; and as often as
they ascended the hill, the coldest minds must have glowed with the
remembrance of their ancestors. II. The first Cæsars had been invested
with the exclusive coinage of the gold and silver; to the senate they
abandoned the baser metal of bronze or copper: ^38 the emblems and
legends were inscribed on a more ample field by the genius of flattery;
and the prince was relieved from the care of celebrating his own
virtues. The successors of Diocletian despised even the flattery of the
senate: their royal officers at Rome, and in the provinces, assumed the
sole direction of the mint; and the same prerogative was inherited by
the Gothic kings of Italy, and the long series of the Greek, the French,
and the German dynasties. After an abdication of eight hundred years,
the Roman senate asserted this honorable and lucrative privilege; which
was tacitly renounced by the popes, from Paschal the Second to the
establishment of their residence beyond the Alps. Some of these
republican coins of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries are shown in
the cabinets of the curious. On one of these, a gold medal, Christ is
depictured holding in his left hand a book with this inscription: "The
vow of the Roman senate and people: Rome the capital of the world;" on
the reverse, St. Peter delivering a banner to a kneeling senator in his
cap and gown, with the name and arms of his family impressed on a
shield. ^39 III. With the empire, the præfect of the city had declined
to a municipal officer; yet he still exercised in the last appeal the
civil and criminal jurisdiction; and a drawn sword, which he received
from the successors of Otho, was the mode of his investiture and the
emblem of his functions. ^40 The dignity was confined to the noble
families of Rome: the choice of the people was ratified by the pope; but
a triple oath of fidelity must have often embarrassed the præfect in the
conflict of adverse duties. ^41 A servant, in whom they possessed but a
third share, was dismissed by the independent Romans: in his place they
elected a patrician; but this title, which Charlemagne had not
disdained, was too lofty for a citizen or a subject; and, after the
first fervor of rebellion, they consented without reluctance to the
restoration of the præfect. About fifty years after this event, Innocent
the Third, the most ambitious, or at least the most fortunate, of the
Pontiffs, delivered the Romans and himself from this badge of foreign
dominion: he invested the præfect with a banner instead of a sword, and
absolved him from all dependence of oaths or service to the German
emperors. ^42 In his place an ecclesiastic, a present or future
cardinal, was named by the pope to the civil government of Rome; but his
jurisdiction has been reduced to a narrow compass; and in the days of
freedom, the right or exercise was derived from the senate and people.
IV. After the revival of the senate, ^43 the conscript fathers (if I may
use the expression) were invested with the legislative and executive
power; but their views seldom reached beyond the present day; and that
day was most frequently disturbed by violence and tumult. In its utmost
plenitude, the order or assembly consisted of fifty-six senators, ^44
the most eminent of whom were distinguished by the title of counsellors:
they were nominated, perhaps annually, by the people; and a previous
choice of their electors, ten persons in each region, or parish, might
afford a basis for a free and permanent constitution. The popes, who in
this tempest submitted rather to bend than to break, confirmed by treaty
the establishment and privileges of the senate, and expected from time,
peace, and religion, the restoration of their government. The motives of
public and private interest might sometimes draw from the Romans an
occasional and temporary sacrifice of their claims; and they renewed
their oath of allegiance to the successor of St. Peter and Constantine,
the lawful head of the church and the republic. ^45

[Footnote 36: After many disputes among the antiquaries of Rome, it
seems determined, that the summit of the Capitoline hill next the river
is strictly the Mons Tarpeius, the Arx; and that on the other summit,
the church and convent of Araceli, the barefoot friars of St. Francis
occupy the temple of Jupiter, (Nardini, Roma Antica, l. v. c. 11--16. *)

Note: * The authority of Nardini is now vigorously impugned, and the
question of the Arx and the Temple of Jupiter revived, with new
arguments by Niebuhr and his accomplished follower, M. Bunsen. Roms
Beschreibung, vol. iii. p. 12, et seqq. -- M.]

[Footnote 37: Tacit. Hist. iii. 69, 70.]

[Footnote 38: This partition of the noble and baser metals between the
emperor and senate must, however, be adopted, not as a positive fact,
but as the probable opinion of the best antiquaries, * (see the Science
des Medailles of the Père Joubert, tom. ii. p. 208--211, in the improved
and scarce edition of the Baron de la Bastie.)

Note: * Dr. Cardwell (Lecture on Ancient Coins, p. 70, et seq.) assigns
convincing reasons in support of this opinion. -- M.]

[Footnote 39: In his xxviith dissertation on the Antiquities of Italy,
(tom. ii. p. 559--569,) Muratori exhibits a series of the senatorian
coins, which bore the obscure names of Affortiati, Infortiati,
Provisini, Paparini. During this period, all the popes, without
excepting Boniface VIII, abstained from the right of coining, which was
resumed by his successor Benedict XI., and regularly exercised in the
court of Avignon.]

[Footnote 40: A German historian, Gerard of Reicherspeg (in Baluz.
Miscell. tom. v. p. 64, apud Schmidt, Hist. des Allemands, tom. iii. p.
265) thus describes the constitution of Rome in the xith century:
Grandiora urbis et orbis negotia spectant ad Romanum pontificem itemque
ad Romanum Imperatorem, sive illius vicarium urbis præfectum, qui de
suâdignitate respicit utrumque, videlicet dominum papam cui facit
hominum, et dominum imperatorem a quo accipit suæpotestatis insigne,
scilicet gladium exertum.]

[Footnote 41: The words of a contemporary writer (Pandulph. Pisan. in
Vit. Paschal. II. p. 357, 358) describe the election and oath of the
præfect in 1118, inconsultis patribus . . . . loca præfectoria . . . .
Laudes præfectoriæ. . . . comitiorum applausum . . . . juraturum populo
in ambonem sublevant . . . . confirmari eum in urbe præfectum petunt.]

[Footnote 42: Urbis præfectum ad ligiam fidelitatem recepit, et per
mantum quod illi donavit de præfecturâeum publice investivit, qui usque
ad id tempus juramento fidelitatis imperatori fuit obligatus et ab eo
præfecturætenuit honorem, (Gesta Innocent. III. in Muratori, tom. iii.
P. i. p. 487.)]

[Footnote 43: See Otho Frising. Chron. vii. 31, de Gest. Frederic. I.,
l. i. c. 27.]

[Footnote 44: Cur countryman, Roger Hoveden, speaks of the single
senators, of the Capuzzifamily, &c., quorum temporibus melius regebatur
Roma quam nunc (A.D. 1194) est temporibus lvi. senatorum, (Ducange,
Gloss. tom. vi. p. 191, Senatores.)]

[Footnote 45: Muratori (dissert. xlii. tom. iii. p. 785--788) has
published an original treaty: Concordia inter D. nostrum papam Clementem
III. et senatores populi Romani super regalibus et aliis dignitatibus
urbis, &c., anno 44°senatûs. The senate speaks, and speaks with
authority: Reddimus ad præsens . . . . habebimus . . . . dabitis
presbetria . . . . jurabimus pacem et fidelitatem, &c. A chartula de
Tenementis Tusculani, dated in the 47th year of the same æra, and
confirmed decreto amplissimi ordinis senatûs, acclamatione P. R. publice
Capitolio consistentis. It is there we find the difference of senatores
consiliarii and simple senators, (Muratori, dissert. xlii. tom. iii. p.
787--789.)]

The union and vigor of a public council was dissolved in a lawless city;
and the Romans soon adopted a more strong and simple mode of
administration. They condensed the name and authority of the senate in a
single magistrate, or two colleagues; and as they were changed at the
end of a year, or of six months, the greatness of the trust was
compensated by the shortness of the term. But in this transient reign,
the senators of Rome indulged their avarice and ambition: their justice
was perverted by the interest of their family and faction; and as they
punished only their enemies, they were obeyed only by their adherents.
Anarchy, no longer tempered by the pastoral care of their bishop,
admonished the Romans that they were incapable of governing themselves;
and they sought abroad those blessings which they were hopeless of
finding at home. In the same age, and from the same motives, most of the
Italian republics were prompted to embrace a measure, which, however
strange it may seem, was adapted to their situation, and productive of
the most salutary effects. ^46 They chose, in some foreign but friendly
city, an impartial magistrate of noble birth and unblemished character,
a soldier and a statesman, recommended by the voice of fame and his
country, to whom they delegated for a time the supreme administration of
peace and war. The compact between the governor and the governed was
sealed with oaths and subscriptions; and the duration of his power, the
measure of his stipend, the nature of their mutual obligations, were
defined with scrupulous precision. They swore to obey him as their
lawful superior: he pledged his faith to unite the indifference of a
stranger with the zeal of a patriot. At his choice, four or six knights
and civilians, his assessors in arms and justice, attended the Podesta,
^47 who maintained at his own expense a decent retinue of servants and
horses: his wife, his son, his brother, who might bias the affections of
the judge, were left behind: during the exercise of his office he was
not permitted to purchase land, to contract an alliance, or even to
accept an invitation in the house of a citizen; nor could he honorably
depart till he had satisfied the complaints that might be urged against
his government.

[Footnote 46: Muratori (dissert. xlv. tom. iv. p. 64--92) has fully
explained this mode of government; and the Occulus Pastoralis, which he
has given at the end, is a treatise or sermon on the duties of these
foreign magistrates.]

[Footnote 47: In the Latin writers, at least of the silver age, the
title of Potestaswas transferred from the office to the magistrate: --

Hujus qui trahitur prætextam sumere mavis;

An Fidenarum Gabiorumque esse Potestas.

Juvenal. Satir. x. 99.11]

Chapter LXIX: State Of Rome From The Twelfth Century. -- Part III.

It was thus, about the middle of the thirteenth century, that the Romans
called from Bologna the senator Brancaleone, ^48 whose fame and merit
have been rescued from oblivion by the pen of an English historian. A
just anxiety for his reputation, a clear foresight of the difficulties
of the task, had engaged him to refuse the honor of their choice: the
statutes of Rome were suspended, and his office prolonged to the term of
three years. By the guilty and licentious he was accused as cruel; by
the clergy he was suspected as partial; but the friends of peace and
order applauded the firm and upright magistrate by whom those blessings
were restored. No criminals were so powerful as to brave, so obscure as
to elude, the justice of the senator. By his sentence two nobles of the
Annibaldi family were executed on a gibbet; and he inexorably
demolished, in the city and neighborhood, one hundred and forty towers,
the strong shelters of rapine and mischief. The bishop, as a simple
bishop, was compelled to reside in his diocese; and the standard of
Brancaleone was displayed in the field with terror and effect. His
services were repaid by the ingratitude of a people unworthy of the
happiness which they enjoyed. By the public robbers, whom he had
provoked for their sake, the Romans were excited to depose and imprison
their benefactor; nor would his life have been spared, if Bologna had
not possessed a pledge for his safety. Before his departure, the prudent
senator had required the exchange of thirty hostages of the noblest
families of Rome: on the news of his danger, and at the prayer of his
wife, they were more strictly guarded; and Bologna, in the cause of
honor, sustained the thunders of a papal interdict. This generous
resistance allowed the Romans to compare the present with the past; and
Brancaleone was conducted from the prison to the Capitol amidst the
acclamations of a repentant people. The remainder of his government was
firm and fortunate; and as soon as envy was appeased by death, his head,
enclosed in a precious vase, was deposited on a lofty column of marble.
^49

[Footnote 48: See the life and death of Brancaleone, in the Historia
Major of Matthew Paris, p. 741, 757, 792, 797, 799, 810, 823, 833, 836,
840. The multitude of pilgrims and suitors connected Rome and St.
Albans, and the resentment of the English clergy prompted them to
rejoice when ever the popes were humbled and oppressed.]

[Footnote 49: Matthew Paris thus ends his account: Caput vero ipsius
Brancaleonis in vase pretioso super marmoream columnam collocatum, in
signum sui valoris et probitatis, quasi reliquias, superstitiose nimis
et pompose sustulerunt. Fuerat enim superborum potentum et malefactorum
urbis malleus et extirpator, et populi protector et defensor veritatis
et justitiæimitator et amator, (p. 840.) A biographer of Innocent IV.
(Muratori, Script. tom. iii. P. i. p. 591, 592) draws a less favorable
portrait of this Ghibeline senator.]

The impotence of reason and virtue recommended in Italy a more effectual
choice: instead of a private citizen, to whom they yielded a voluntary
and precarious obedience, the Romans elected for their senator some
prince of independent power, who could defend them from their enemies
and themselves. Charles of Anjou and Provence, the most ambitious and
warlike monarch of the age, accepted at the same time the kingdom of
Naples from the pope, and the office of senator from the Roman people.
^50 As he passed through the city, in his road to victory, he received
their oath of allegiance, lodged in the Lateran palace, and smoothed in
a short visit the harsh features of his despotic character. Yet even
Charles was exposed to the inconstancy of the people, who saluted with
the same acclamations the passage of his rival, the unfortunate
Conradin; and a powerful avenger, who reigned in the Capitol, alarmed
the fears and jealousy of the popes. The absolute term of his life was
superseded by a renewal every third year; and the enmity of Nicholas the
Third obliged the Sicilian king to abdicate the government of Rome. In
his bull, a perpetual law, the imperious pontiff asserts the truth,
validity, and use of the donation of Constantine, not less essential to
the peace of the city than to the independence of the church;
establishes the annual election of the senator; and formally
disqualifies all emperors, kings, princes, and persons of an eminent and
conspicuous rank. ^51 This prohibitory clause was repealed in his own
behalf by Martin the Fourth, who humbly solicited the suffrage of the
Romans. In the presence, and by the authority, of the people, two
electors conferred, not on the pope, but on the noble and faithful
Martin, the dignity of senator, and the supreme administration of the
republic, ^52 to hold during his natural life, and to exercise at
pleasure by himself or his deputies. About fifty years afterwards, the
same title was granted to the emperor Lewis of Bavaria; and the liberty
of Rome was acknowledged by her two sovereigns, who accepted a municipal
office in the government of their own metropolis.

[Footnote 50: The election of Charles of Anjou to the office of
perpetual senator of Rome is mentioned by the historians in the viiith
volume of the Collection of Muratori, by Nicholas de Jamsilla, (p. 592,)
the monk of Padua, (p. 724,) Sabas Malaspina, (l. ii. c. 9, p. 308,) and
Ricordano Malespini, (c. 177, p. 999.)]

[Footnote 51: The high-sounding bull of Nicholas III., which founds his
temporal sovereignty on the donation of Constantine, is still extant;
and as it has been inserted by Boniface VIII. in the Sexteof the
Decretals, it must be received by the Catholics, or at least by the
Papists, as a sacred and perpetual law.]

[Footnote 52: I am indebted to Fleury (Hist. Ecclés. tom. xviii. p. 306)
for an extract of this Roman act, which he has taken from the
Ecclesiastical Annals of Odericus Raynaldus, A.D. 1281, No. 14, 15.]

In the first moments of rebellion, when Arnold of Brescia had inflamed
their minds against the church, the Romans artfully labored to
conciliate the favor of the empire, and to recommend their merit and
services in the cause of Cæsar. The style of their ambassadors to Conrad
the Third and Frederic the First is a mixture of flattery and pride, the
tradition and the ignorance of their own history. ^53 After some
complaint of his silence and neglect, they exhort the former of these
princes to pass the Alps, and assume from their hands the Imperial
crown. "We beseech your majesty not to disdain the humility of your sons
and vassals, not to listen to the accusations of our common enemies; who
calumniate the senate as hostile to your throne, who sow the seeds of
discord, that they may reap the harvest of destruction. The pope and the
Sicilianare united in an impious league to oppose ourliberty and
yourcoronation. With the blessing of God, our zeal and courage has
hitherto defeated their attempts. Of their powerful and factious
adherents, more especially the Frangipani, we have taken by assault the
houses and turrets: some of these are occupied by our troops, and some
are levelled with the ground. The Milvian bridge, which they had broken,
is restored and fortified for your safe passage; and your army may enter
the city without being annoyed from the castle of St. Angelo. All that
we have done, and all that we design, is for your honor and service, in
the loyal hope, that you will speedily appear in person, to vindicate
those rights which have been invaded by the clergy, to revive the
dignity of the empire, and to surpass the fame and glory of your
predecessors. May you fix your residence in Rome, the capital of the
world; give laws to Italy, and the Teutonic kingdom; and imitate the
example of Constantine and Justinian, ^54 who, by the vigor of the
senate and people, obtained the sceptre of the earth." ^55 But these
splendid and fallacious wishes were not cherished by Conrad the
Franconian, whose eyes were fixed on the Holy Land, and who died without
visiting Rome soon after his return from the Holy Land.

[Footnote 53: These letters and speeches are preserved by Otho bishop of
Frisingen, (Fabric. Bibliot. Lat. Med. et Infim. tom. v. p. 186, 187,)
perhaps the noblest of historians: he was son of Leopold marquis of
Austria; his mother, Agnes, was daughter of the emperor Henry IV., and
he was half-brother and uncle to Conrad III. and Frederic I. He has
left, in seven books, a Chronicle of the Times; in two, the Gesta
Frederici I., the last of which is inserted in the vith volume of
Muratori's historians.]

[Footnote 54: We desire (said the ignorant Romans) to restore the empire
in um statum, quo fuit tempore Constantini et Justiniani, qui totum
orbem vigore senatûs et populi Romani suis tenuere manibus.]

[Footnote 55: Otho Frising. de Gestis Frederici I. l. i. c. 28, p.
662--664.]

His nephew and successor, Frederic Barbarossa, was more ambitious of the
Imperial crown; nor had any of the successors of Otho acquired such
absolute sway over the kingdom of Italy. Surrounded by his
ecclesiastical and secular princes, he gave audience in his camp at
Sutri to the ambassadors of Rome, who thus addressed him in a free and
florid oration: "Incline your ear to the queen of cities; approach with
a peaceful and friendly mind the precincts of Rome, which has cast away
the yoke of the clergy, and is impatient to crown her legitimate
emperor. Under your auspicious influence, may the primitive times be
restored. Assert the prerogatives of the eternal city, and reduce under
her monarchy the insolence of the world. You are not ignorant, that, in
former ages, by the wisdom of the senate, by the valor and discipline of
the equestrian order, she extended her victorious arms to the East and
West, beyond the Alps, and over the islands of the ocean. By our sins,
in the absence of our princes, the noble institution of the senate has
sunk in oblivion; and with our prudence, our strength has likewise
decreased. We have revived the senate, and the equestrian order: the
counsels of the one, the arms of the other, will be devoted to your
person and the service of the empire. Do you not hear the language of
the Roman matron? You were a guest, I have adopted you as a citizen; a
Transalpine stranger, I have elected you for my sovereign; ^56 and given
you myself, and all that is mine. Your first and most sacred duty is to
swear and subscribe, that you will shed your blood for the republic;
that you will maintain in peace and justice the laws of the city and the
charters of your predecessors; and that you will reward with five
thousand pounds of silver the faithful senators who shall proclaim your
titles in the Capitol. With the name, assume the character, of
Augustus." The flowers of Latin rhetoric were not yet exhausted; but
Frederic, impatient of their vanity, interrupted the orators in the high
tone of royalty and conquest. "Famous indeed have been the fortitude and
wisdom of the ancient Romans; but your speech is not seasoned with
wisdom, and I could wish that fortitude were conspicuous in your
actions. Like all sublunary things, Rome has felt the vicissitudes of
time and fortune. Your noblest families were translated to the East, to
the royal city of Constantine; and the remains of your strength and
freedom have long since been exhausted by the Greeks and Franks. Are you
desirous of beholding the ancient glory of Rome, the gravity of the
senate, the spirit of the knights, the discipline of the camp, the valor
of the legions? you will find them in the German republic. It is not
empire, naked and alone, the ornaments and virtues of empire have
likewise migrated beyond the Alps to a more deserving people: ^57 they
will be employed in your defence, but they claim your obedience. You
pretend that myself or my predecessors have been invited by the Romans:
you mistake the word; they were not invited, they were implored. From
its foreign and domestic tyrants, the city was rescued by Charlemagne
and Otho, whose ashes repose in our country; and their dominion was the
price of your deliverance. Under that dominion your ancestors lived and
died. I claim by the right of inheritance and possession, and who shall
dare to extort you from my hands? Is the hand of the Franks ^58 and
Germans enfeebled by age? Am I vanquished? Am I a captive? Am I not
encompassed with the banners of a potent and invincible army? You impose
conditions on your master; you require oaths: if the conditions are
just, an oath is superfluous; if unjust, it is criminal. Can you doubt
my equity? It is extended to the meanest of my subjects. Will not my
sword be unsheathed in the defence of the Capitol? By that sword the
northern kingdom of Denmark has been restored to the Roman empire. You
prescribe the measure and the objects of my bounty, which flows in a
copious but a voluntary stream. All will be given to patient merit; all
will be denied to rude importunity." ^59 Neither the emperor nor the
senate could maintain these lofty pretensions of dominion and liberty.
United with the pope, and suspicious of the Romans, Frederic continued
his march to the Vatican; his coronation was disturbed by a sally from
the Capitol; and if the numbers and valor of the Germans prevailed in
the bloody conflict, he could not safely encamp in the presence of a
city of which he styled himself the sovereign. About twelve years
afterwards, he besieged Rome, to seat an antipope in the chair of St.
Peter; and twelve Pisan galleys were introduced into the Tyber: but the
senate and people were saved by the arts of negotiation and the progress
of disease; nor did Frederic or his successors reiterate the hostile
attempt. Their laborious reigns were exercised by the popes, the
crusades, and the independence of Lombardy and Germany: they courted the
alliance of the Romans; and Frederic the Second offered in the Capitol
the great standard, the Caroccioof Milan. ^60 After the extinction of
the house of Swabia, they were banished beyond the Alps: and their last
coronations betrayed the impotence and poverty of the Teutonic Cæsars.
^61

[Footnote 56: Hospes eras, civem feci. Advena fuisti ex Transalpinis
partibus principem constitui.]

[Footnote 57: Non cessit nobis nudum imperium, virtute sua amictum
venit, ornamenta sua secum traxit. Penes nos sunt consules tui, &c.
Cicero or Livy would not have rejected these images, the eloquence of a
Barbarian born and educated in the Hercynian forest.]

[Footnote 58: Otho of Frisingen, who surely understood the language of
the court and diet of Germany, speaks of the Franks in the xiith century
as the reigning nation, (Proceres Franci, equites Franci, manus
Francorum:) he adds, however, the epithet of Teutonici.]

[Footnote 59: Otho Frising. de Gestis Frederici I., l. ii. c. 22, p.
720--733. These original and authentic acts I have translated and
abridged with freedom, yet with fidelity.]

[Footnote 60: From the Chronicles of Ricobaldo and Francis Pipin,
Muratori (dissert. xxvi. tom. ii. p. 492) has translated this curious
fact with the doggerel verses that accompanied the gift: --

Ave decus orbis, ave! victus tibi destinor, ave!

Currus ab Augusto Frederico Cæsare justo.

VæMediolanum! jam sentis spernere vanum

Imperii vires, proprias tibi tollere vires.

Ergo triumphorum urbs potes memor esse priorum

Quos tibi mittebant reges qui bella gerebant.

Ne si dee tacere (I now use the Italian Dissertations, tom. i. p. 444)
che nell' anno 1727, una copia desso Caroccio in marmo dianzi ignoto si
scopri, nel campidoglio, presso alle carcere di quel luogo, dove Sisto
V. l'avea falto rinchiudere. Stava esso posto sopra quatro colonne di
marmo fino colla sequente inscrizione, &c.; to the same purpose as the
old inscription.]

[Footnote 61: The decline of the Imperial arms and authority in Italy is
related with impartial learning in the Annals of Muratori, (tom. x. xi.
xii.;) and the reader may compare his narrative with the Histoires des
Allemands (tom. iii. iv.) by Schmidt, who has deserved the esteem of his
countrymen.]

Under the reign of Adrian, when the empire extended from the Euphrates
to the ocean, from Mount Atlas to the Grampian hills, a fanciful
historian ^62 amused the Romans with the picture of their ancient wars.
"There was a time," says Florus, "when Tibur and Præneste, our summer
retreats, were the objects of hostile vows in the Capitol, when we
dreaded the shades of the Arician groves, when we could triumph without
a blush over the nameless villages of the Sabines and Latins, and even
Corioli could afford a title not unworthy of a victorious general." The
pride of his contemporaries was gratified by the contrast of the past
and the present: they would have been humbled by the prospect of
futurity; by the prediction, that after a thousand years, Rome,
despoiled of empire, and contracted to her primæval limits, would renew
the same hostilities, on the same ground which was then decorated with
her villas and gardens. The adjacent territory on either side of the
Tyber was always claimed, and sometimes possessed, as the patrimony of
St. Peter; but the barons assumed a lawless independence, and the cities
too faithfully copied the revolt and discord of the metropolis. In the
twelfth and thirteenth centuries the Romans incessantly labored to
reduce or destroy the contumacious vassals of the church and senate; and
if their headstrong and selfish ambition was moderated by the pope, he
often encouraged their zeal by the alliance of his spiritual arms. Their
warfare was that of the first consuls and dictators, who were taken from
the plough. The assembled in arms at the foot of the Capitol; sallied
from the gates, plundered or burnt the harvests of their neighbors,
engaged in tumultuary conflict, and returned home after an expedition of
fifteen or twenty days. Their sieges were tedious and unskilful: in the
use of victory, they indulged the meaner passions of jealousy and
revenge; and instead of adopting the valor, they trampled on the
misfortunes, of their adversaries. The captives, in their shirts, with a
rope round their necks, solicited their pardon: the fortifications, and
even the buildings, of the rival cities, were demolished, and the
inhabitants were scattered in the adjacent villages. It was thus that
the seats of the cardinal bishops, Porto, Ostia, Albanum, Tusculum,
Præneste, and Tibur or Tivoli, were successively overthrown by the
ferocious hostility of the Romans. ^63 Of these, ^64 Porto and Ostia,
the two keys of the Tyber, are still vacant and desolate: the marshy and
unwholesome banks are peopled with herds of buffaloes, and the river is
lost to every purpose of navigation and trade. The hills, which afford a
shady retirement from the autumnal heats, have again smiled with the
blessings of peace; Frescati has arisen near the ruins of Tusculum;
Tibur or Tivoli has resumed the honors of a city, ^65 and the meaner
towns of Albano and Palestrina are decorated with the villas of the
cardinals and princes of Rome. In the work of destruction, the ambition
of the Romans was often checked and repulsed by the neighboring cities
and their allies: in the first siege of Tibur, they were driven from
their camp; and the battles of Tusculum ^66 and Viterbo ^67 might be
compared in their relative state to the memorable fields of Thrasymene
and Cannæ. In the first of these petty wars, thirty thousand Romans were
overthrown by a thousand German horse, whom Frederic Barbarossa had
detached to the relief of Tusculum: and if we number the slain at three,
the prisoners at two, thousand, we shall embrace the most authentic and
moderate account. Sixty-eight years afterwards they marched against
Viterbo in the ecclesiastical state with the whole force of the city; by
a rare coalition the Teutonic eagle was blended, in the adverse banners,
with the keys of St. Peter; and the pope's auxiliaries were commanded by
a count of Thoulouse and a bishop of Winchester. The Romans were
discomfited with shame and slaughter: but the English prelate must have
indulged the vanity of a pilgrim, if he multiplied their numbers to one
hundred, and their loss in the field to thirty, thousand men. Had the
policy of the senate and the discipline of the legions been restored
with the Capitol, the divided condition of Italy would have offered the
fairest opportunity of a second conquest. But in arms, the modern Romans
were not above, and in arts, they were far below, the common level of
the neighboring republics. Nor was their warlike spirit of any long
continuance; after some irregular sallies, they subsided in the national
apathy, in the neglect of military institutions, and in the disgraceful
and dangerous use of foreign mercenaries.

[Footnote 62: Tibur nunc suburbanum, et æstivæPræneste deliciæ,
nuncupatis in Capitolio votis petebantur. The whole passage of Florus
(l. i. c. 11) may be read with pleasure, and has deserved the praise of
a man of genius, (uvres de Montesquieu, tom. iii. p. 634, 635, quarto
edition.)]

[Footnote 63: Ne a feritate Romanorum, sicut fuerant Hostienses,
Portuenses, Tusculanenses, Albanenses, Labicenses, et nuper Tiburtini
destruerentur, (Matthew Paris, p. 757.) These events are marked in the
Annals and Index (the xviiith volume) of Muratori.]

[Footnote 64: For the state or ruin of these suburban cities, the banks
of the Tyber, &c., see the lively picture of the P. Labat, (Voyage en
Espagne et en Italiæ,) who had long resided in the neighborhood of Rome,
and the more accurate description of which P. Eschinard (Roma, 1750, in
octavo) has added to the topographical map of Cingolani.]

[Footnote 65: Labat (tom. iii. p. 233) mentions a recent decree of the
Roman government, which has severely mortified the pride and poverty of
Tivoli: in civitate Tiburtinânon vivitur civiliter.]

[Footnote 66: I depart from my usual method, of quoting only by the date
the Annals of Muratori, in consideration of the critical balance in
which he has weighed nine contemporary writers who mention the battle of
Tusculum, (tom. x. p. 42--44.)]

[Footnote 67: Matthew Paris, p. 345. This bishop of Winchester was Peter
de Rupibus, who occupied the see thirty-two years, (A.D. 1206--1238.)
and is described, by the English historian, as a soldier and a
statesman. (p. 178, 399.)]

Ambition is a weed of quick and early vegetation in the vineyard of
Christ. Under the first Christian princes, the chair of St. Peter was
disputed by the votes, the venality, the violence, of a popular
election: the sanctuaries of Rome were polluted with blood; and, from
the third to the twelfth century, the church was distracted by the
mischief of frequent schisms. As long as the final appeal was determined
by the civil magistrate, these mischiefs were transient and local: the
merits were tried by equity or favor; nor could the unsuccessful
competitor long disturb the triumph of his rival. But after the emperors
had been divested of their prerogatives, after a maxim had been
established that the vicar of Christ is amenable to no earthly tribunal,
each vacancy of the holy see might involve Christendom in controversy
and war. The claims of the cardinals and inferior clergy, of the nobles
and people, were vague and litigious: the freedom of choice was
overruled by the tumults of a city that no longer owned or obeyed a
superior. On the decease of a pope, two factions proceeded in different
churches to a double election: the number and weight of votes, the
priority of time, the merit of the candidates, might balance each other:
the most respectable of the clergy were divided; and the distant
princes, who bowed before the spiritual throne, could not distinguish
the spurious, from the legitimate, idol. The emperors were often the
authors of the schism, from the political motive of opposing a friendly
to a hostile pontiff; and each of the competitors was reduced to suffer
the insults of his enemies, who were not awed by conscience, and to
purchase the support of his adherents, who were instigated by avarice or
ambition a peaceful and perpetual succession was ascertained by
Alexander the Third, ^68 who finally abolished the tumultuary votes of
the clergy and people, and defined the right of election in the sole
college of cardinals. ^69 The three orders of bishops, priests, and
deacons, were assimilated to each other by this important privilege; the
parochial clergy of Rome obtained the first rank in the hierarchy: they
were indifferently chosen among the nations of Christendom; and the
possession of the richest benefices, of the most important bishoprics,
was not incompatible with their title and office. The senators of the
Catholic church, the coadjutors and legates of the supreme pontiff, were
robed in purple, the symbol of martyrdom or royalty; they claimed a
proud equality with kings; and their dignity was enhanced by the
smallness of their number, which, till the reign of Leo the Tenth,
seldom exceeded twenty or twenty-five persons. By this wise regulation,
all doubt and scandal were removed, and the root of schism was so
effectually destroyed, that in a period of six hundred years a double
choice has only once divided the unity of the sacred college. But as the
concurrence of two thirds of the votes had been made necessary, the
election was often delayed by the private interest and passions of the
cardinals; and while they prolonged their independent reign, the
Christian world was left destitute of a head. A vacancy of almost three
years had preceded the elevation of George the Tenth, who resolved to
prevent the future abuse; and his bull, after some opposition, has been
consecrated in the code of the canon law. ^70 Nine days are allowed for
the obsequies of the deceased pope, and the arrival of the absent
cardinals; on the tenth, they are imprisoned, each with one domestic, in
a common apartment or conclave, without any separation of walls or
curtains: a small window is reserved for the introduction of
necessaries; but the door is locked on both sides and guarded by the
magistrates of the city, to seclude them from all correspondence with
the world. If the election be not consummated in three days, the luxury
of their table is contracted to a single dish at dinner and supper; and
after the eighth day, they are reduced to a scanty allowance of bread,
water, and wine. During the vacancy of the holy see, the cardinals are
prohibited from touching the revenues, or assuming, unless in some rare
emergency, the government of the church: all agreements and promises
among the electors are formally annulled; and their integrity is
fortified by their solemn oath and the prayers of the Catholics. Some
articles of inconvenient or superfluous rigor have been gradually
relaxed, but the principle of confinement is vigorous and entire: they
are still urged, by the personal motives of health and freedom, to
accelerate the moment of their deliverance; and the improvement of
ballot or secret votes has wrapped the struggles of the conclave ^71 in
the silky veil of charity and politeness. ^72 By these institutions the
Romans were excluded from the election of their prince and bishop; and
in the fever of wild and precarious liberty, they seemed insensible of
the loss of this inestimable privilege. The emperor Lewis of Bavaria
revived the example of the great Otho. After some negotiation with the
magistrates, the Roman people were assembled ^73 in the square before
St. Peter's: the pope of Avignon, John the Twenty-second, was deposed:
the choice of his successor was ratified by their consent and applause.
They freely voted for a new law, that their bishop should never be
absent more than three months in the year, and two days' journey from
the city; and that if he neglected to return on the third summons, the
public servant should be degraded and dismissed. ^74 But Lewis forgot
his own debility and the prejudices of the times: beyond the precincts
of a German camp, his useless phantom was rejected; the Romans despised
their own workmanship; the antipope implored the mercy of his lawful
sovereign; ^75 and the exclusive right of the cardinals was more firmly
established by this unseasonable attack.

[Footnote 68: See Mosheim, Institut. Histor. Ecclesiast. p. 401, 403.
Alexander himself had nearly been the victim of a contested election;
and the doubtful merits of Innocent had only preponderated by the weight
of genius and learning which St. Bernard cast into the scale, (see his
life and writings.)]

[Footnote 69: The origin, titles, importance, dress, precedency, &c., of
the Roman cardinals, are very ably discussed by Thomassin, (Discipline
de l'Eglise, tom. i. p. 1262--1287;) but their purple is now much faded.
The sacred college was raised to the definite number of seventy-two, to
represent, under his vicar, the disciples of Christ.]

[Footnote 70: See the bull of Gregory X. approbante sacro concilio, in
the Sextsof the Canon Law, (l. i. tit. 6, c. 3,) a supplement to the
Decretals, which Boniface VIII. promulgated at Rome in 1298, and
addressed in all the universities of Europe.]

[Footnote 71: The genius of Cardinal de Retz had a right to paint a
conclave, (of 1665,) in which he was a spectator and an actor,
(Mémoires, tom. iv. p. 15--57;) but I am at a loss to appreciate the
knowledge or authority of an anonymous Italian, whose history (Conclavi
de' Pontifici Romani, in 4to. 1667) has been continued since the reign
of Alexander VII. The accidental form of the work furnishes a lesson,
though not an antidote, to ambition. From a labyrinth of intrigues, we
emerge to the adoration of the successful candidate; but the next page
opens with his funeral.]

[Footnote 72: The expressions of Cardinal de Retz are positive and
picturesque: On y vecut toujours ensemble avec le même respect, et la
même civilitéque l'on observe dans le cabinet des rois, avec la même
politesse qu'on avoit dans la cour de Henri III., avec la même
familiaritéque l'on voit dans les colleges; avec la même modestie, qui
se remarque dans les noviciats; et avec la même charité, du moins en
apparence, qui pourroit ètre entre des frères parfaitement unis.]

[Footnote 73: Richiesti per bando (says John Villani) sanatori di Roma,
e 52 del popolo, et capitani de' 25, e consoli, (consoli?) et 13 buone
huomini, uno per rione. Our knowledge is too imperfect to pronounce how
much of this constitution was temporary, and how much ordinary and
permanent. Yet it is faintly illustrated by the ancient statutes of
Rome.]

[Footnote 74: Villani (l. x. c. 68--71, in Muratori, Script. tom. xiii.
p. 641--645) relates this law, and the whole transaction, with much less
abhorrence than the prudent Muratori. Any one conversant with the darker
ages must have observed how much the sense (I mean the nonsense) of
superstition is fluctuating and inconsistent.]

[Footnote 75: In the first volume of the Popes of Avignon, see the
second original Life of John XXII. p. 142--145, the confession of the
antipope p. 145--152, and the laborious notes of Baluze, p. 714, 715.]

Had the election been always held in the Vatican, the rights of the
senate and people would not have been violated with impunity. But the
Romans forgot, and were forgotten. in the absence of the successors of
Gregory the Seventh, who did not keep as a divine precept their ordinary
residence in the city and diocese. The care of that diocese was less
important than the government of the universal church; nor could the
popes delight in a city in which their authority was always opposed, and
their person was often endangered. From the persecution of the emperors,
and the wars of Italy, they escaped beyond the Alps into the hospitable
bosom of France; from the tumults of Rome they prudently withdrew to
live and die in the more tranquil stations of Anagni, Perugia, Viterbo,
and the adjacent cities. When the flock was offended or impoverished by
the absence of the shepherd, they were recalled by a stern admonition,
that St. Peter had fixed his chair, not in an obscure village, but in
the capital of the world; by a ferocious menace, that the Romans would
march in arms to destroy the place and people that should dare to afford
them a retreat. They returned with timorous obedience; and were saluted
with the account of a heavy debt, of all the losses which their
desertion had occasioned, the hire of lodgings, the sale of provisions,
and the various expenses of servants and strangers who attended the
court. ^76 After a short interval of peace, and perhaps of authority,
they were again banished by new tumults, and again summoned by the
imperious or respectful invitation of the senate. In these occasional
retreats, the exiles and fugitives of the Vatican were seldom long, or
far, distant from the metropolis; but in the beginning of the fourteenth
century, the apostolic throne was transported, as it might seem forever,
from the Tyber to the Rhône; and the cause of the transmigration may be
deduced from the furious contest between Boniface the Eighth and the
king of France. ^77 The spiritual arms of excommunication and interdict
were repulsed by the union of the three estates, and the privileges of
the Gallican church; but the pope was not prepared against the carnal
weapons which Philip the Fair had courage to employ. As the pope resided
at Anagni, without the suspicion of danger, his palace and person were
assaulted by three hundred horse, who had been secretly levied by
William of Nogaret, a French minister, and Sciarra Colonna, of a noble
but hostile family of Rome. The cardinals fled; the inhabitants of
Anagni were seduced from their allegiance and gratitude; but the
dauntless Boniface, unarmed and alone, seated himself in his chair, and
awaited, like the conscript fathers of old, the swords of the Gauls.
Nogaret, a foreign adversary, was content to execute the orders of his
master: by the domestic enmity of Colonna, he was insulted with words
and blows; and during a confinement of three days his life was
threatened by the hardships which they inflicted on the obstinacy which
they provoked. Their strange delay gave time and courage to the
adherents of the church, who rescued him from sacrilegious violence; but
his imperious soul was wounded in the vital part; and Boniface expired
at Rome in a frenzy of rage and revenge. His memory is stained with the
glaring vices of avarice and pride; nor has the courage of a martyr
promoted this ecclesiastical champion to the honors of a saint; a
magnanimous sinner, (say the chronicles of the times,) who entered like
a fox, reigned like a lion, and died like a dog. He was succeeded by
Benedict the Eleventh, the mildest of mankind. Yet he excommunicated the
impious emissaries of Philip, and devoted the city and people of Anagni
by a tremendous curse, whose effects are still visible to the eyes of
superstition. ^78

[Footnote 76: Romani autem non valentes nec volentes ultra suam celare
cupiditatem gravissimam, contra papam movere cperunt questionem,
exigentes ab eo urgentissime omnia quæsubierant per ejus absentiam damna
et jacturas, videlicet in hispitiis locandis, in mercimoniis, in usuris,
in redditibus, in provisionibus, et in aliis modis innumerabilibus. Quòd
cum audisset papa, præcordialiter ingemuit, et se comperiens
muscipulatum, &c., Matt. Paris, p. 757. For the ordinary history of the
popes, their life and death, their residence and absence, it is enough
to refer to the ecclesiastical annalists, Spondanus and Fleury.]

[Footnote 77: Besides the general historians of the church of Italy and
of France, we possess a valuable treatise composed by a learned friend
of Thuanus, which his last and best editors have published in the
appendix (Histoire particulière du grand Différend entre Boniface VIII
et Philippe le Bel, par Pierre du Puis, tom. vii. P. xi. p. 61--82.)]

[Footnote 78: It is difficult to know whether Labat (tom. iv. p. 53--57)
be in jest or in earnest, when he supposes that Anagni still feels the
weight of this curse, and that the cornfields, or vineyards, or
olive-trees, are annually blasted by Nature, the obsequious handmaid of
the popes.]

Chapter LXIX: State Of Rome From The Twelfth Century. -- Part IV.

After his decease, the tedious and equal suspense of the conclave was
fixed by the dexterity of the French faction. A specious offer was made
and accepted, that, in the term of forty days, they would elect one of
the three candidates who should be named by their opponents. The
archbishop of Bourdeaux, a furious enemy of his king and country, was
the first on the list; but his ambition was known; and his conscience
obeyed the calls of fortune and the commands of a benefactor, who had
been informed by a swift messenger that the choice of a pope was now in
his hands. The terms were regulated in a private interview; and with
such speed and secrecy was the business transacted, that the unanimous
conclave applauded the elevation of Clement the Fifth. ^79 The cardinals
of both parties were soon astonished by a summons to attend him beyond
the Alps; from whence, as they soon discovered, they must never hope to
return. He was engaged, by promise and affection, to prefer the
residence of France; and, after dragging his court through Poitou and
Gascony, and devouring, by his expense, the cities and convents on the
road, he finally reposed at Avignon, ^80 which flourished above seventy
years ^81 the seat of the Roman pontiff and the metropolis of
Christendom. By land, by sea, by the Rhône, the position of Avignon was
on all sides accessible; the southern provinces of France do not yield
to Italy itself; new palaces arose for the accommodation of the pope and
cardinals; and the arts of luxury were soon attracted by the treasures
of the church. They were already possessed of the adjacent territory,
the Venaissin county, ^82 a populous and fertile spot; and the
sovereignty of Avignon was afterwards purchased from the youth and
distress of Jane, the first queen of Naples and countess of Provence,
for the inadequate price of fourscore thousand florins. ^83 Under the
shadow of a French monarchy, amidst an obedient people, the popes
enjoyed an honorable and tranquil state, to which they long had been
strangers: but Italy deplored their absence; and Rome, in solitude and
poverty, might repent of the ungovernable freedom which had driven from
the Vatican the successor of St. Peter. Her repentance was tardy and
fruitless: after the death of the old members, the sacred college was
filled with French cardinals, ^84 who beheld Rome and Italy with
abhorrence and contempt, and perpetuated a series of national, and even
provincial, popes, attached by the most indissoluble ties to their
native country.

[Footnote 79: See, in the Chronicle of Giovanni Villani, (l. viii. c.
63, 64, 80, in Muratori, tom. xiii.,) the imprisonment of Boniface
VIII., and the election of Clement V., the last of which, like most
anecdotes, is embarrassed with some difficulties.]

[Footnote 80: The original lives of the eight popes of Avignon, Clement
V., John XXII., Benedict XI., Clement VI., Innocent VI., Urban V.,
Gregory XI., and Clement VII., are published by Stephen Baluze,
(VitæPaparum Avenionensium; Paris, 1693, 2 vols. in 4to.,) with copious
and elaborate notes, and a second volume of acts and documents. With the
true zeal of an editor and a patriot, he devoutly justifies or excuses
the characters of his countrymen.]

[Footnote 81: The exile of Avignon is compared by the Italians with
Babylon, and the Babylonish captivity. Such furious metaphors, more
suitable to the ardor of Petrarch than to the judgment of Muratori, are
gravely refuted in Baluze's preface. The abbéde Sade is distracted
between the love of Petrarch and of his country. Yet he modestly pleads,
that many of the local inconveniences of Avignon are now removed; and
many of the vices against which the poet declaims, had been imported
with the Roman court by the strangers of Italy, (tom. i. p. 23--28.)]

[Footnote 82: The comtat Venaissin was ceded to the popes in 1273 by
Philip III. king of France, after he had inherited the dominions of the
count of Thoulouse. Forty years before, the heresy of Count Raymond had
given them a pretence of seizure, and they derived some obscure claim
from the xith century to some lands citra Rhodanum, (Valesii Notitia
Galliarum, p. 495, 610. Longuerue, Description de la France, tom. i. p.
376--381.)]

[Footnote 83: If a possession of four centuries were not itself a title,
such objections might annul the bargain; but the purchase money must be
refunded, for indeed it was paid. Civitatem Avenionem emit . . . . per
ejusmodi venditionem pecuniâredundates, &c., (iidaVita Clement. VI. in
Baluz. tom. i. p. 272. Muratori, Script. tom. iii. P. ii. p. 565.) The
only temptation for Jane and her second husband was ready money, and
without it they could not have returned to the throne of Naples.]

[Footnote 84: Clement V immediately promoted ten cardinals, nine French
and one English, (Vita ivta, p. 63, et Baluz. p. 625, &c.) In 1331, the
pope refused two candidates recommended by the king of France, quod xx.
Cardinales, de quibus xvii. de regno Franciæoriginem traxisse noscuntur
in memorato collegio existant, (Thomassin, Discipline de l'Eglise, tom.
i. p. 1281.)]

The progress of industry had produced and enriched the Italian
republics: the æra of their liberty is the most flourishing period of
population and agriculture, of manufactures and commerce; and their
mechanic labors were gradually refined into the arts of elegance and
genius. But the position of Rome was less favorable, the territory less
fruitful: the character of the inhabitants was debased by indolence and
elated by pride; and they fondly conceived that the tribute of subjects
must forever nourish the metropolis of the church and empire. This
prejudice was encouraged in some degree by the resort of pilgrims to the
shrines of the apostles; and the last legacy of the popes, the
institution of the holy year, ^85 was not less beneficial to the people
than to the clergy. Since the loss of Palestine, the gift of plenary
indulgences, which had been applied to the crusades, remained without an
object; and the most valuable treasure of the church was sequestered
above eight years from public circulation. A new channel was opened by
the diligence of Boniface the Eighth, who reconciled the vices of
ambition and avarice; and the pope had sufficient learning to recollect
and revive the secular games which were celebrated in Rome at the
conclusion of every century. To sound without danger the depth of
popular credulity, a sermon was seasonably pronounced, a report was
artfully scattered, some aged witnesses were produced; and on the first
of January of the year thirteen hundred, the church of St. Peter was
crowded with the faithful, who demanded the customary indulgence of the
holy time. The pontiff, who watched and irritated their devout
impatience, was soon persuaded by ancient testimony of the justice of
their claim; and he proclaimed a plenary absolution to all Catholics
who, in the course of that year, and at every similar period, should
respectfully visit the apostolic churches of St. Peter and St. Paul. The
welcome sound was propagated through Christendom; and at first from the
nearest provinces of Italy, and at length from the remote kingdoms of
Hungary and Britain, the highways were thronged with a swarm of pilgrims
who sought to expiate their sins in a journey, however costly or
laborious, which was exempt from the perils of military service. All
exceptions of rank or sex, of age or infirmity, were forgotten in the
common transport; and in the streets and churches many persons were
trampled to death by the eagerness of devotion. The calculation of their
numbers could not be easy nor accurate; and they have probably been
magnified by a dexterous clergy, well apprised of the contagion of
example: yet we are assured by a judicious historian, who assisted at
the ceremony, that Rome was never replenished with less than two hundred
thousand strangers; and another spectator has fixed at two millions the
total concourse of the year. A trifling oblation from each individual
would accumulate a royal treasure; and two priests stood night and day,
with rakes in their hands, to collect, without counting, the heaps of
gold and silver that were poured on the altar of St. Paul. ^86 It was
fortunately a season of peace and plenty; and if forage was scarce, if
inns and lodgings were extravagantly dear, an inexhaustible supply of
bread and wine, of meat and fish, was provided by the policy of Boniface
and the venal hospitality of the Romans. From a city without trade or
industry, all casual riches will speedily evaporate: but the avarice and
envy of the next generation solicited Clement the Sixth ^87 to
anticipate the distant period of the century. The gracious pontiff
complied with their wishes; afforded Rome this poor consolation for his
loss; and justified the change by the name and practice of the Mosaic
Jubilee. ^88 His summons was obeyed; and the number, zeal, and
liberality of the pilgrims did not yield to the primitive festival. But
they encountered the triple scourge of war, pestilence, and famine: many
wives and virgins were violated in the castles of Italy; and many
strangers were pillaged or murdered by the savage Romans, no longer
moderated by the presence of their bishops. ^89 To the impatience of the
popes we may ascribe the successive reduction to fifty, thirty-three,
and twenty-five years; although the second of these terms is
commensurate with the life of Christ. The profusion of indulgences, the
revolt of the Protestants, and the decline of superstition, have much
diminished the value of the jubilee; yet even the nineteenth and last
festival was a year of pleasure and profit to the Romans; and a
philosophic smile will not disturb the triumph of the priest or the
happiness of the people. ^90

[Footnote 85: Our primitive account is from Cardinal James Caietan,
(Maxima Bibliot. Patrum, tom. xxv.;) and I am at a loss to determine
whether the nephew of Boniface VIII. be a fool or a knave: the uncle is
a much clearer character.]

[Footnote 86: See John Villani (l. viii. c. 36) in the xiith, and the
Chronicon Astense, in the xith volume (p. 191, 192) of Muratori's
Collection Papa innumerabilem pecuniam ab eisdem accepit, nam duo
clerici, cum rastris, &c.]

[Footnote 87: The two bulls of Boniface VIII. and Clement VI. are
inserted on the Corpus Juris Canonici, Extravagant. Commun. l. v. tit.
ix c 1, 2.)]

[Footnote 88: The sabbatic years and jubilees of the Mosaic law, (Car.
Sigon. de Republica Hebræorum, Opp. tom. iv. l. iii. c. 14, 14, p. 151,
152,) the suspension of all care and labor, the periodical release of
lands, debts, servitude, &c., may seem a noble idea, but the execution
would be impracticable in a profanerepublic; and I should be glad to
learn that this ruinous festival was observed by the Jewish people.]

[Footnote 89: See the Chronicle of Matteo Villani, (l. i. c. 56,) in the
xivth vol. of Muratori, and the Mémoires sur la Vie de Pétrarque, tom.
iii. p. 75--89.]

[Footnote 90: The subject is exhausted by M. Chais, a French minister at
the Hague, in his Lettres Historiques et Dogmatiques, sur les Jubilés et
es Indulgences; la Haye, 1751, 3 vols. in 12mo.; an elaborate and
pleasing work, had not the author preferred the character of a polemic
to that of a philosopher.]

In the beginning of the eleventh century, Italy was exposed to the
feudal tyranny, alike oppressive to the sovereign and the people. The
rights of human nature were vindicated by her numerous republics, who
soon extended their liberty and dominion from the city to the adjacent
country. The sword of the nobles was broken; their slaves were
enfranchised; their castles were demolished; they assumed the habits of
society and obedience; their ambition was confined to municipal honors,
and in the proudest aristocracy of Venice on Genoa, each patrician was
subject to the laws. ^91 But the feeble and disorderly government of
Rome was unequal to the task of curbing her rebellious sons, who scorned
the authority of the magistrate within and without the walls. It was no
longer a civil contention between the nobles and plebeians for the
government of the state: the barons asserted in arms their personal
independence; their palaces and castles were fortified against a siege;
and their private quarrels were maintained by the numbers of their
vassals and retainers. In origin and affection, they were aliens to
their country: ^92 and a genuine Roman, could such have been produced,
might have renounced these haughty strangers, who disdained the
appellation of citizens, and proudly styled themselves the princes, of
Rome. ^93 After a dark series of revolutions, all records of pedigree
were lost; the distinction of surnames was abolished; the blood of the
nations was mingled in a thousand channels; and the Goths and Lombards,
the Greeks and Franks, the Germans and Normans, had obtained the fairest
possessions by royal bounty, or the prerogative of valor. These examples
might be readily presumed; but the elevation of a Hebrew race to the
rank of senators and consuls is an event without a parallel in the long
captivity of these miserable exiles. ^94 In the time of Leo the Ninth, a
wealthy and learned Jew was converted to Christianity, and honored at
his baptism with the name of his godfather, the reigning Pope. The zeal
and courage of Peter the son of Leo were signalized in the cause of
Gregory the Seventh, who intrusted his faithful adherent with the
government of Adrian's mole, the tower of Crescentius, or, as it is now
called, the castle of St. Angelo. Both the father and the son were the
parents of a numerous progeny: their riches, the fruits of usury, were
shared with the noblest families of the city; and so extensive was their
alliance, that the grandson of the proselyte was exalted by the weight
of his kindred to the throne of St. Peter. A majority of the clergy and
people supported his cause: he reigned several years in the Vatican; and
it is only the eloquence of St. Bernard, and the final triumph of
Innocence the Second, that has branded Anacletus with the epithet of
antipope. After his defeat and death, the posterity of Leo is no longer
conspicuous; and none will be found of the modern nobles ambitious of
descending from a Jewish stock. It is not my design to enumerate the
Roman families which have failed at different periods, or those which
are continued in different degrees of splendor to the present time. ^95
The old consular line of the Frangipanidiscover their name in the
generous act of breakingor dividing bread in a time of famine; and such
benevolence is more truly glorious than to have enclosed, with their
allies the Corsi, a spacious quarter of the city in the chains of their
fortifications; the Savelli, as it should seem a Sabine race, have
maintained their original dignity; the obsolete surname of the
Capizucchiis inscribed on the coins of the first senators; the
Contipreserve the honor, without the estate, of the counts of Signia;
and the Annibaldimust have been very ignorant, or very modest, if they
had not descended from the Carthaginian hero. ^96

[Footnote 91: Muratori (Dissert. xlvii.) alleges the Annals of Florence,
Padua, Genoa, &c., the analogy of the rest, the evidence of Otho of
Frisingen, (de Gest. Fred. I. l. ii. c. 13,) and the submission of the
marquis of Este.]

[Footnote 92: As early as the year 824, the emperor Lothaire I. found it
expedient to interrogate the Roman people, to learn from each individual
by what national law he chose to be governed. (Muratori, Dissertat
xxii.)]

[Footnote 93: Petrarch attacks these foreigners, the tyrants of Rome, in
a declamation or epistle, full of bold truths and absurd pedantry, in
which he applies the maxims, and even prejudices, of the old republic to
the state of the xivth century, (Mémoires, tom. iii. p. 157--169.)]

[Footnote 94: The origin and adventures of the Jewish family are noticed
by Pagi, (Critica, tom. iv. p. 435, A.D. 1124, No. 3, 4,) who draws his
information from the Chronographus Maurigniacensis, and Arnulphus
Sagiensis de Schismate, (in Muratori, Script. Ital. tom. iii. P. i. p.
423--432.) The fact must in some degree be true; yet I could wish that
it had been coolly related, before it was turned into a reproach against
the antipope.]

[Footnote 95: Muratori has given two dissertations (xli. and xlii.) to
the names, surnames, and families of Italy. Some nobles, who glory in
their domestic fables, may be offended with his firm and temperate
criticism; yet surely some ounces of pure gold are of more value than
many pounds of base metal.]

[Footnote 96: The cardinal of St. George, in his poetical, or rather
metrical history of the election and coronation of Boniface VIII.,
(Muratori Script. Ital. tom. iii. P. i. p. 641, &c.,) describes the
state and families of Rome at the coronation of Boniface VIII., (A.D.
1295.)

Interea titulis redimiti sanguine et armis

Illustresque viri Romanâa stirpe trahentes

Nomen in emeritos tantævirtutis honores

Insulerant sese medios festumque colebant

Aurata fulgente togâ, sociante catervâ.

Ex ipsis devota domus præstantis ab Ursâ

Ecclesiæ, vultumque gerens demissius altum

Festa Columnajocis, necnon Sabelliamitis;

Stephanides senior, Comites, Annibalicaproles,

Præfectusque urbis magnum sine viribus nomen.

(l. ii. c. 5, 100, p. 647, 648.)

The ancient statutes of Rome (l. iii. c. 59, p. 174, 175) distinguish
eleven families of barons, who are obliged to swear in concilio communi,
before the senator, that they would not harbor or protect any
malefactors, outlaws, &c. -- a feeble security!]

But among, perhaps above, the peers and princes of the city, I
distinguish the rival houses of Colonna and Ursini, whose private story
is an essential part of the annals of modern Rome. I. The name and arms
of Colonna ^97 have been the theme of much doubtful etymology; nor have
the orators and antiquarians overlooked either Trajan's pillar, or the
columns of Hercules, or the pillar of Christ's flagellation, or the
luminous column that guided the Israelites in the desert. Their first
historical appearance in the year eleven hundred and four attests the
power and antiquity, while it explains the simple meaning, of the name.
By the usurpation of Cavæ, the Colonna provoked the arms of Paschal the
Second; but they lawfully held in the Campagna of Rome the hereditary
fiefs of Zagarola and Colonna; and the latter of these towns was
probably adorned with some lofty pillar, the relic of a villa or temple.
^98 They likewise possessed one moiety of the neighboring city of
Tusculum, a strong presumption of their descent from the counts of
Tusculum, who in the tenth century were the tyrants of the apostolic
see. According to their own and the public opinion, the primitive and
remote source was derived from the banks of the Rhine; ^99 and the
sovereigns of Germany were not ashamed of a real or fabulous affinity
with a noble race, which in the revolutions of seven hundred years has
been often illustrated by merit and always by fortune. ^100 About the
end of the thirteenth century, the most powerful branch was composed of
an uncle and six bothers, all conspicuous in arms, or in the honors of
the church. Of these, Peter was elected senator of Rome, introduced to
the Capitol in a triumphal car, and hailed in some vain acclamations
with the title of Cæsar; while John and Stephen were declared marquis of
Ancona and count of Romagna, by Nicholas the Fourth, a patron so partial
to their family, that he has been delineated in satirical portraits,
imprisoned as it were in a hollow pillar. ^101 After his decease their
haughty behavior provoked the displeasure of the most implacable of
mankind. The two cardinals, the uncle and the nephew, denied the
election of Boniface the Eighth; and the Colonna were oppressed for a
moment by his temporal and spiritual arms. ^102 He proclaimed a crusade
against his personal enemies; their estates were confiscated; their
fortresses on either side of the Tyber were besieged by the troops of
St. Peter and those of the rival nobles; and after the ruin of
Palestrina or Præneste, their principal seat, the ground was marked with
a ploughshare, the emblem of perpetual desolation. Degraded, banished,
proscribed, the six brothers, in disguise and danger, wandered over
Europe without renouncing the hope of deliverance and revenge. In this
double hope, the French court was their surest asylum; they prompted and
directed the enterprise of Philip; and I should praise their
magnanimity, had they respected the misfortune and courage of the
captive tyrant. His civil acts were annulled by the Roman people, who
restored the honors and possessions of the Colonna; and some estimate
may be formed of their wealth by their losses, of their losses by the
damages of one hundred thousand gold florins which were granted them
against the accomplices and heirs of the deceased pope. All the
spiritual censures and disqualifications were abolished ^103 by his
prudent successors; and the fortune of the house was more firmly
established by this transient hurricane. The boldness of Sciarra Colonna
was signalized in the captivity of Boniface, and long afterwards in the
coronation of Lewis of Bavaria; and by the gratitude of the emperor, the
pillar in their arms was encircled with a royal crown. But the first of
the family in fame and merit was the elder Stephen, whom Petrarch loved
and esteemed as a hero superior to his own times, and not unworthy of
ancient Rome. Persecution and exile displayed to the nations his
abilities in peace and war; in his distress he was an object, not of
pity, but of reverence; the aspect of danger provoked him to avow his
name and country; and when he was asked, "Where is now your fortress?"
he laid his hand on his heart, and answered, "Here." He supported with
the same virtue the return of prosperity; and, till the ruin of his
declining age, the ancestors, the character, and the children of Stephen
Colonna, exalted his dignity in the Roman republic, and at the court of
Avignon. II. The Ursini migrated from Spoleto; ^104 the sons of Ursus,
as they are styled in the twelfth century, from some eminent person, who
is only known as the father of their race. But they were soon
distinguished among the nobles of Rome, by the number and bravery of
their kinsmen, the strength of their towers, the honors of the senate
and sacred college, and the elevation of two popes, Celestin the Third
and Nicholas the Third, of their name and lineage. ^105 Their riches may
be accused as an early abuse of nepotism: the estates of St. Peter were
alienated in their favor by the liberal Celestin; ^106 and Nicholas was
ambitious for their sake to solicit the alliance of monarchs; to found
new kingdoms in Lombardy and Tuscany; and to invest them with the
perpetual office of senators of Rome. All that has been observed of the
greatness of the Colonna will likewise redeemed to the glory of the
Ursini, their constant and equal antagonists in the long hereditary
feud, which distracted above two hundred and fifty years the
ecclesiastical state. The jealously of preeminence and power was the
true ground of their quarrel; but as a specious badge of distinction,
the Colonna embraced the name of Ghibelines and the party of the empire;
the Ursini espoused the title of Guelphs and the cause of the church.
The eagle and the keys were displayed in their adverse banners; and the
two factions of Italy most furiously raged when the origin and nature of
the dispute were long since forgotten. ^107 After the retreat of the
popes to Avignon they disputed in arms the vacant republic; and the
mischiefs of discord were perpetuated by the wretched compromise of
electing each year two rival senators. By their private hostilities the
city and country were desolated, and the fluctuating balance inclined
with their alternate success. But none of either family had fallen by
the sword, till the most renowned champion of the Ursini was surprised
and slain by the younger Stephen Colonna. ^108 His triumph is stained
with the reproach of violating the truce; their defeat was basely
avenged by the assassination, before the church door, of an innocent boy
and his two servants. Yet the victorious Colonna, with an annual
colleague, was declared senator of Rome during the term of five years.
And the muse of Petrarch inspired a wish, a hope, a prediction, that the
generous youth, the son of his venerable hero, would restore Rome and
Italy to their pristine glory; that his justice would extirpate the
wolves and lions, the serpents and bears, who labored to subvert the
eternal basis of the marble column. ^109

[Footnote 97: It is pity that the Colonna themselves have not favored
the world with a complete and critical history of their illustrious
house. I adhere to Muratori, (Dissert. xlii. tom. iii. p. 647, 648.)]

[Footnote 98: Pandulph. Pisan. in Vit. Paschal. II. in Muratori, Script.
Ital. tom. iii. P. i. p. 335. The family has still great possessions in
the Campagna of Rome; but they have alienated to the Rospigliosi this
original fief of Colonna, (Eschinard, p. 258, 259.)]

[Footnote 99:

Te longinqua dedit tellus et pascua Rheni,

says Petrarch; and, in 1417, a duke of Guelders and Juliers acknowledges
(Lenfant, Hist. du Concile de Constance, tom. ii. p. 539) his descent
from the ancestors of Martin V., (Otho Colonna:) but the royal author of
the Memoirs of Brandenburg observes, that the sceptre in his arms has
been confounded with the column. To maintain the Roman origin of the
Colonna, it was ingeniously supposed (Diario di Monaldeschi, in the
Script. Ital. tom. xii. p. 533) that a cousin of the emperor Nero
escaped from the city, and founded Mentz in Germany.]

[Footnote 100: I cannot overlook the Roman triumph of ovation on Marce
Antonio Colonna, who had commanded the pope's galleys at the naval
victory of Lepanto, (Thuan. Hist. l. 7, tom. iii. p. 55, 56. Muret.
Oratio x. Opp. tom. i. p. 180--190.)]

[Footnote 101: Muratori, Annali d'Italia, tom. x. p. 216, 220.]

[Footnote 102: Petrarch's attachment to the Colonna has authorized the
abbéde Sade to expatiate on the state of the family in the fourteenth
century, the persecution of Boniface VIII., the character of Stephen and
his sons, their quarrels with the Ursini, &c., (Mémoires sur Pétrarque,
tom. i. p. 98--110, 146--148, 174--176, 222--230, 275--280.) His
criticism often rectifies the hearsay stories of Villani, and the errors
of the less diligent moderns. I understand the branch of Stephen to be
now extinct.]

[Footnote 103: Alexander III. had declared the Colonna who adhered to
the emperor Frederic I. incapable of holding any ecclesiastical
benefice, (Villani, l. v. c. 1;) and the last stains of annual
excommunication were purified by Sixtus V., (Vita di Sisto V. tom. iii.
p. 416.) Treason, sacrilege, and proscription are often the best titles
of ancient nobility.]

[Footnote 104:

-------- Vallis te proxima misit,

Appenninigenæqua prata virentia sylvæ

Spoletana metunt armenta gregesque protervi.

Monaldeschi (tom. xii. Script. Ital. p. 533) gives the Ursini a French
origin, which may be remotely true.]

[Footnote 105: In the metrical life of Celestine V. by the cardinal of
St. George (Muratori, tom. iii. P. i. p. 613, &c.,) we find a luminous,
and not inelegant, passage, (l. i. c. 3, p. 203 &c.:) --

-------- genuit quem nobilis Ursæ(Ursi?)

Progenies, Romana domus, veterataque magnis

Fascibus in clero, pompasque experta senatûs,

Bellorumque manûgrandi stipata parentum

Cardineos apices necnon fastigia dudum

Papatûs iteratatenens.

Muratori (Dissert. xlii. tom. iii.) observes, that the first Ursini
pontificate of Celestine III. was unknown: he is inclined to read
Ursiprogenies.]

[Footnote 106: Filii Ursi, quondam Clestini papænepotes, de bonis
ecclesiæRomanæditati, (Vit. Innocent. III. in Muratori, Script. tom.
iii. P. i.) The partial prodigality of Nicholas III. is more conspicuous
in Villani and Muratori. Yet the Ursini would disdain the nephews of a
modernpope.]

[Footnote 107: In his fifty-first Dissertation on the Italian
Antiquities, Muratori explains the factions of the Guelphs and
Ghibelines.]

[Footnote 108: Petrarch (tom. i. p. 222--230) has celebrated this
victory according to the Colonna; but two contemporaries, a Florentine
(Giovanni Villani, l. x. c. 220) and a Roman, (Ludovico Monaldeschi, p.
532--534,) are less favorable to their arms.]

[Footnote 109: The abbéde Sade (tom. i. Notes, p. 61--66) has applied
the vith Canzone of Petrarch, Spirto Gentil, &c., to Stephen Colonna the
younger:

Orsi, lupi, leoni, aquile e serpi

Al una gran marmorea colexna

Fanno noja sovente e àse danno. 11]

Chapter LXX: Final Settlement Of The Ecclesiastical State.Part I.

Character And Coronation Of Petrarch. -- Restoration Of The Freedom And
Government Of Rome By The Tribune Rienzi. -- His Virtues And Vices, His
Expulsion And Death. -- Return Of The Popes From Avignon. -- Great
Schism Of The West. -- Reunion Of The Latin Church. -- Last Struggles Of
Roman Liberty. -- Statutes Of Rome. -- Final Settlement Of The
Ecclesiastical State.

In the apprehension of modern times, Petrarch ^1 is the Italian songster
of Laura and love. In the harmony of his Tuscan rhymes, Italy applauds,
or rather adores, the father of her lyric poetry; and his verse, or at
least his name, is repeated by the enthusiasm, or affectation, of
amorous sensibility. Whatever may be the private taste of a stranger,
his slight and superficial knowledge should humbly acquiesce in the
judgment of a learned nation; yet I may hope or presume, that the
Italians do not compare the tedious uniformity of sonnets and elegies
with the sublime compositions of their epic muse, the original wildness
of Dante, the regular beauties of Tasso, and the boundless variety of
the incomparable Ariosto. The merits of the lover I am still less
qualified to appreciate: nor am I deeply interested in a metaphysical
passion for a nymph so shadowy, that her existence has been questioned;
^2 for a matron so prolific, ^3 that she was delivered of eleven
legitimate children, ^4 while her amorous swain sighed and sung at the
fountain of Vaucluse. ^5 But in the eyes of Petrarch, and those of his
graver contemporaries, his love was a sin, and Italian verse a frivolous
amusement. His Latin works of philosophy, poetry, and eloquence,
established his serious reputation, which was soon diffused from Avignon
over France and Italy: his friends and disciples were multiplied in
every city; and if the ponderous volume of his writings ^6 be now
abandoned to a long repose, our gratitude must applaud the man, who by
precept and example revived the spirit and study of the Augustan age.
From his earliest youth, Petrarch aspired to the poetic crown. The
academical honors of the three faculties had introduced a royal degree
of master or doctor in the art of poetry; ^7 and the title of
poet-laureate, which custom, rather than vanity, perpetuates in the
English court, ^8 was first invented by the Cæsars of Germany. In the
musical games of antiquity, a prize was bestowed on the victor: ^9 the
belief that Virgil and Horace had been crowned in the Capitol inflamed
the emulation of a Latin bard; ^10 and the laurel ^11 was endeared to
the lover by a verbal resemblance with the name of his mistress. The
value of either object was enhanced by the difficulties of the pursuit;
and if the virtue or prudence of Laura was inexorable, ^12 he enjoyed,
and might boast of enjoying, the nymph of poetry. His vanity was not of
the most delicate kind, since he applauds the success of his own labors;
his name was popular; his friends were active; the open or secret
opposition of envy and prejudice was surmounted by the dexterity of
patient merit. In the thirty-sixth year of his age, he was solicited to
accept the object of his wishes; and on the same day, in the solitude of
Vaucluse, he received a similar and solemn invitation from the senate of
Rome and the university of Paris. The learning of a theological school,
and the ignorance of a lawless city, were alike unqualified to bestow
the ideal though immortal wreath which genius may obtain from the free
applause of the public and of posterity: but the candidate dismissed
this troublesome reflection; and after some moments of complacency and
suspense, preferred the summons of the metropolis of the world.

[Footnote 1: The Mémoires sur la Vie de François Pétrarque, (Amsterdam,
1764, 1767, 3 vols. in 4to.,) form a copious, original, and entertaining
work, a labor of love, composed from the accurate study of Petrarch and
his contemporaries; but the hero is too often lost in the general
history of the age, and the author too often languishes in the
affectation of politeness and gallantry. In the preface to his first
volume, he enumerates and weighs twenty Italian biographers, who have
professedly treated of the same subject.]

[Footnote 2: The allegorical interpretation prevailed in the xvth
century; but the wise commentators were not agreed whether they should
understand by Laura, religion, or virtue, or the blessed virgin, or
--------. See the prefaces to the first and second volume.]

[Footnote 3: Laure de Noves, born about the year 1307, was married in
January 1325, to Hugues de Sade, a noble citizen of Avignon, whose
jealousy was not the effect of love, since he married a second wife
within seven months of her death, which happened the 6th of April, 1348,
precisely one-and-twenty years after Petrarch had seen and loved her.]

[Footnote 4: Corpus crebris partubus exhaustum: from one of these is
issued, in the tenth degree, the abbéde Sade, the fond and grateful
biographer of Petrarch; and this domestic motive most probably suggested
the idea of his work, and urged him to inquire into every circumstance
that could affect the history and character of his grandmother, (see
particularly tom. i. p. 122--133, notes, p. 7--58, tom. ii. p. 455--495
not. p. 76--82.)]

[Footnote 5: Vaucluse, so familiar to our English travellers, is
described from the writings of Petrarch, and the local knowledge of his
biographer, (Mémoires, tom. i. p. 340--359.) It was, in truth, the
retreat of a hermit; and the moderns are much mistaken, if they place
Laura and a happy lover in the grotto.]

[Footnote 6: Of 1250 pages, in a close print, at Basil in the xvith
century, but without the date of the year. The abbéde Sade calls aloud
for a new edition of Petrarch's Latin works; but I much doubt whether it
would redound to the profit of the bookseller, or the amusement of the
public.]

[Footnote 7: Consult Selden's Titles of Honor, in his works, (vol. iii.
p. 457--466.) A hundred years before Petrarch, St. Francis received the
visit of a poet, qui ab imperatore fuerat coronatus et exinde rex
versuum dictus.]

[Footnote 8: From Augustus to Louis, the muse has too often been false
and venal: but I much doubt whether any age or court can produce a
similar establishment of a stipendiary poet, who in every reign, and at
all events, is bound to furnish twice a year a measure of praise and
verse, such as may be sung in the chapel, and, I believe, in the
presence, of the sovereign. I speak the more freely, as the best time
for abolishing this ridiculous custom is while the prince is a man of
virtue and the poet a man of genius.]

[Footnote 9: Isocrates (in Panegyrico, tom. i. p. 116, 117, edit.
Battie, Cantab. 1729) claims for his native Athens the glory of first
instituting and recommending the alwnaV -- kai ta aqla megista -- mh
monon tacouV kai rwmhV, alla kai logwn kai gnwmhV. The example of the
Panathenæa was imitated at Delphi; but the Olympic games were ignorant
of a musical crown, till it was extorted by the vain tyranny of Nero,
(Sueton. in Nerone, c. 23; Philostrat. apud Casaubon ad locum; Dion
Cassius, or Xiphilin, l. lxiii. p. 1032, 1041. Potter's Greek
Antiquities, vol. i. p. 445, 450.)]

[Footnote 10: The Capitoline games (certamen quinquenale, musicum,
equestre, gymnicum) were instituted by Domitian (Sueton. c. 4) in the
year of Christ 86, (Censorin. de Die Natali, c. 18, p. 100, edit.
Havercamp.) and were not abolished in the ivth century, (Ausonius de
Professoribus Burdegal. V.) If the crown were given to superior merit,
the exclusion of Statius (Capitolia nostræinficiata lyræ, Sylv. l. iii.
v. 31) may do honor to the games of the Capitol; but the Latin poets who
lived before Domitian were crowned only in the public opinion.]

[Footnote 11: Petrarch and the senators of Rome were ignorant that the
laurel was not the Capitoline, but the Delphic crown, (Plin. Hist. Natur
p. 39. Hist. Critique de la République des Lettres, tom. i. p.
150--220.) The victors in the Capitol were crowned with a garland of oak
eaves, (Martial, l. iv. epigram 54.)]

[Footnote 12: The pious grandson of Laura has labored, and not without
success, to vindicate her immaculate chastity against the censures of
the grave and the sneers of the profane, (tom. ii. notes, p. 76--82.)]

The ceremony of his coronation ^13 was performed in the Capitol, by his
friend and patron the supreme magistrate of the republic. Twelve
patrician youths were arrayed in scarlet; six representatives of the
most illustrious families, in green robes, with garlands of flowers,
accompanied the procession; in the midst of the princes and nobles, the
senator, count of Anguillara, a kinsman of the Colonna, assumed his
throne; and at the voice of a herald Petrarch arose. After discoursing
on a text of Virgil, and thrice repeating his vows for the prosperity of
Rome, he knelt before the throne, and received from the senator a laurel
crown, with a more precious declaration, "This is the reward of merit."
The people shouted, "Long life to the Capitol and the poet!" A sonnet in
praise of Rome was accepted as the effusion of genius and gratitude; and
after the whole procession had visited the Vatican, the profane wreath
was suspended before the shrine of St. Peter. In the act or diploma ^14
which was presented to Petrarch, the title and prerogatives of
poet-laureate are revived in the Capitol, after the lapse of thirteen
hundred years; and he receives the perpetual privilege of wearing, at
his choice, a crown of laurel, ivy, or myrtle, of assuming the poetic
habit, and of teaching, disputing, interpreting, and composing, in all
places whatsoever, and on all subjects of literature. The grant was
ratified by the authority of the senate and people; and the character of
citizen was the recompense of his affection for the Roman name. They did
him honor, but they did him justice. In the familiar society of Cicero
and Livy, he had imbibed the ideas of an ancient patriot; and his ardent
fancy kindled every idea to a sentiment, and every sentiment to a
passion. The aspect of the seven hills and their majestic ruins
confirmed these lively impressions; and he loved a country by whose
liberal spirit he had been crowned and adopted. The poverty and
debasement of Rome excited the indignation and pity of her grateful son;
he dissembled the faults of his fellow-citizens; applauded with partial
fondness the last of their heroes and matrons; and in the remembrance of
the past, in the hopes of the future, was pleased to forget the miseries
of the present time. Rome was still the lawful mistress of the world:
the pope and the emperor, the bishop and general, had abdicated their
station by an inglorious retreat to the Rhône and the Danube; but if she
could resume her virtue, the republic might again vindicate her liberty
and dominion. Amidst the indulgence of enthusiasm and eloquence, ^15
Petrarch, Italy, and Europe, were astonished by a revolution which
realized for a moment his most splendid visions. The rise and fall of
the tribune Rienzi will occupy the following pages: ^16 the subject is
interesting, the materials are rich, and the glance of a patriot bard
^17 will sometimes vivify the copious, but simple, narrative of the
Florentine, ^18 and more especially of the Roman, historian. ^19

[Footnote 13: The whole process of Petrarch's coronation is accurately
described by the abbéde Sade, (tom. i. p. 425--435, tom. ii. p. 1--6,
notes, p. 1--13,) from his own writings, and the Roman diary of
Ludovico, Monaldeschi, without mixing in this authentic narrative the
more recent fables of Sannuccio Delbene.]

[Footnote 14: The original act is printed among the Pieces
Justificatives in the Mémoires sur Pétrarque, tom. iii. p. 50--53.]

[Footnote 15: To find the proofs of his enthusiasm for Rome, I need only
request that the reader would open, by chance, either Petrarch, or his
French biographer. The latter has described the poet's first visit to
Rome, (tom. i. p. 323--335.) But in the place of much idle rhetoric and
morality, Petrarch might have amused the present and future age with an
original account of the city and his coronation.]

[Footnote 16: It has been treated by the pen of a Jesuit, the P. de
Cerceau whose posthumous work (Conjuration de Nicolas Gabrini, dit de
Rienzi, Tyran de Rome, en 1347) was published at Paris, 1748, in 12mo. I
am indebted to him for some facts and documents in John Hocsemius, canon
of Liege, a contemporary historian, (Fabricius Bibliot. Lat. Med. Ævi,
tom. iii. p. 273, tom. iv. p. 85.)]

[Footnote 17: The abbéde Sade, who so freely expatiates on the history
of the xivth century, might treat, as his proper subject, a revolution
in which the heart of Petrarch was so deeply engaged, (Mémoires, tom.
ii. p. 50, 51, 320--417, notes, p. 70--76, tom. iii. p. 221--243,
366--375.) Not an idea or a fact in the writings of Petrarch has
probably escaped him.]

[Footnote 18: Giovanni Villani, l. xii. c. 89, 104, in Muratori, Rerum
Italicarum Scriptores, tom. xiii. p. 969, 970, 981--983.]

[Footnote 19: In his third volume of Italian antiquities, (p. 249--548,)
Muratori has inserted the Fragmenta HistoriæRomanæab Anno 1327 usque ad
Annum 1354, in the original dialect of Rome or Naples in the xivth
century, and a Latin version for the benefit of strangers. It contains
the most particular and authentic life of Cola (Nicholas) di Rienzi;
which had been printed at Bracciano, 1627, in 4to., under the name of
Tomaso Fortifiocca, who is only mentioned in this work as having been
punished by the tribune for forgery. Human nature is scarcely capable of
such sublime or stupid impartiality: but whosoever in the author of
these Fragments, he wrote on the spot and at the time, and paints,
without design or art, the manners of Rome and the character of the
tribune. *

Note: * Since the publication of my first edition of Gibbon, some new
and very remarkable documents have been brought to light in a life of
Nicolas Rienzi,--Cola di Rienzo und seine Zeit, -- by Dr. Felix
Papencordt. The most important of these documents are letters from
Rienzi to Charles the Fourth, emperor and king of Bohemia, and to the
archbishop of Praque; they enter into the whole history of his
adventurous career during its first period, and throw a strong light
upon his extraordinary character. These documents were first discovered
and made use of, to a certain extent, by Pelzel, the historian of
Bohemia. The originals have disappeared, but a copy made by Pelzel for
his own use is now in the library of Count Thun at Teschen. There seems
no doubt of their authenticity. Dr. Papencordt has printed the whole in
his Urkunden, with the exception of one long theological paper. -- M.
1845.]

In a quarter of the city which was inhabited only by mechanics and Jews,
the marriage of an innkeeper and a washer woman produced the future
deliverer of Rome. ^20 ^! From such parents Nicholas Rienzi Gabrini
could inherit neither dignity nor fortune; and the gift of a liberal
education, which they painfully bestowed, was the cause of his glory and
untimely end. The study of history and eloquence, the writings of
Cicero, Seneca, Livy, Cæsar, and Valerius Maximus, elevated above his
equals and contemporaries the genius of the young plebeian: he perused
with indefatigable diligence the manuscripts and marbles of antiquity;
loved to dispense his knowledge in familiar language; and was often
provoked to exclaim, "Where are now these Romans? their virtue, their
justice, their power? why was I not born in those happy times?" ^21 When
the republic addressed to the throne of Avignon an embassy of the three
orders, the spirit and eloquence of Rienzi recommended him to a place
among the thirteen deputies of the commons. The orator had the honor of
haranguing Pope Clement the Sixth, and the satisfaction of conversing
with Petrarch, a congenial mind: but his aspiring hopes were chilled by
disgrace and poverty and the patriot was reduced to a single garment and
the charity of the hospital. ^* From this misery he was relieved by the
sense of merit or the smile of favor; and the employment of apostolic
notary afforded him a daily stipend of five gold florins, a more
honorable and extensive connection, and the right of contrasting, both
in words and actions, his own integrity with the vices of the state. The
eloquence of Rienzi was prompt and persuasive: the multitude is always
prone to envy and censure: he was stimulated by the loss of a brother
and the impunity of the assassins; nor was it possible to excuse or
exaggerate the public calamities. The blessings of peace and justice,
for which civil society has been instituted, were banished from Rome:
the jealous citizens, who might have endured every personal or pecuniary
injury, were most deeply wounded in the dishonor of their wives and
daughters: ^22 they were equally oppressed by the arrogance of the
nobles and the corruption of the magistrates; ^! and the abuse of arms
or of laws was the only circumstance that distinguished the lions from
the dogs and serpents of the Capitol. These allegorical emblems were
variously repeated in the pictures which Rienzi exhibited in the streets
and churches; and while the spectators gazed with curious wonder, the
bold and ready orator unfolded the meaning, applied the satire, inflamed
their passions, and announced a distant hope of comfort and deliverance.
The privileges of Rome, her eternal sovereignty over her princes and
provinces, was the theme of his public and private discourse; and a
monument of servitude became in his hands a title and incentive of
liberty. The decree of the senate, which granted the most ample
prerogatives to the emperor Vespasian, had been inscribed on a copper
plate still extant in the choir of the church of St. John Lateran. ^23 A
numerous assembly of nobles and plebeians was invited to this political
lecture, and a convenient theatre was erected for their reception. The
notary appeared in a magnificent and mysterious habit, explained the
inscription by a version and commentary, ^24 and descanted with
eloquence and zeal on the ancient glories of the senate and people, from
whom all legal authority was derived. The supine ignorance of the nobles
was incapable of discerning the serious tendency of such
representations: they might sometimes chastise with words and blows the
plebeian reformer; but he was often suffered in the Colonna palace to
amuse the company with his threats and predictions; and the modern
Brutus ^25 was concealed under the mask of folly and the character of a
buffoon. While they indulged their contempt, the restoration of the good
estate, his favorite expression, was entertained among the people as a
desirable, a possible, and at length as an approaching, event; and while
all had the disposition to applaud, some had the courage to assist,
their promised deliverer.

[Footnote 20: The first and splendid period of Rienzi, his tribunitian
government, is contained in the xviiith chapter of the Fragments, (p.
399--479,) which, in the new division, forms the iid book of the history
in xxxviii. smaller chapters or sections.]

[Footnote !: But see in Dr. Papencordt's work, and in Rienzi's own
words, his claim to be a bastard son of the emperor Henry the Seventh,
whose intrigue with his mother Rienzi relates with a sort of proud
shamelessness. Compare account by the editor of Dr. Papencordt's work in
Quarterly Review vol. lxix. -- M. 1845.]

[Footnote 21: The reader may be pleased with a specimen of the original
idiom: Fòda soa juventutine nutricato di latte de eloquentia, bono
gramatico, megliore rettuorico, autorista bravo. Deh como et quanto era
veloce leitore! moito usava Tito Livio, Seneca, et Tullio, et Balerio
Massimo, moito li dilettava le magnificentie di Julio Cesare raccontare.
Tutta la die se speculava negl' intagli di marmo lequali iaccio intorno
Roma. Non era altri che esso, che sapesse lejere li antichi pataffii.
Tutte scritture antiche vulgarizzava; quesse fiure di marmo justamente
interpretava. On come spesso diceva, "Dove suono quelli buoni Romani?
dove ene loro somma justitia? poleramme trovare in tempo che quessi
fiuriano!"]

[Footnote *: Sir J. Hobhouse published (in his Illustrations of Childe
Harold) Rienzi's joyful letter to the people of Rome on the apparently
favorable termination of this mission. -- M. 1845.]

[Footnote 22: Petrarch compares the jealousy of the Romans with the easy
temper of the husbands of Avignon, (Mémoires, tom. i. p. 330.)]

[Footnote !: All this Rienzi, writing at a later period to the
archbishop of Prague, attributed to the criminal abandonment of his
flock by the supreme pontiff. See Urkunde apud Papencordt, p. xliv.
Quarterly Review, p. 255. -- M. 1845.]

[Footnote 23: The fragments of the Lex regiamay be found in the
Inscriptions of Gruter, tom. i. p. 242, and at the end of the Tacitus of
Ernesti, with some learned notes of the editor, tom. ii.]

[Footnote 24: I cannot overlook a stupendous and laughable blunder of
Rienzi. The Lex regia empowers Vespasian to enlarge the Pomrium, a word
familiar to every antiquary. It was not so to the tribune; he confounds
it with pomarium, an orchard, translates lo Jardino de Roma cioene
Italia, and is copied by the less excusable ignorance of the Latin
translator (p. 406) and the French historian, (p. 33.) Even the learning
of Muratori has slumbered over the passage.]

[Footnote 25: Priori (Bruto) tamen similior, juvenis uterque, longe
ingenio quam cujus simulationem induerat, ut sub hoc obtentûliberator
ille P R. aperiretur tempore suo . . . . Ille regibus, hic tyrannis
contemptus, (Opp (Opp. p. 536.) *

Note: * Fatcor attamen quod-nunc fatuum. nunc hystrionem, nunc gravem
nunc simplicem, nunc astutum, nunc fervidum, nunc timidum simulatorem,
et dissimulatorem ad hunc caritativum finem, quem dixi, constitusepius
memet ipsum. Writing to an archbishop, (of Prague,) Rienzi alleges
scriptural examples. Saltator coram archa David et insanus apparuit
coram Rege; blanda, astuta, et tecta Judith astitit Holoferni; et astute
Jacob meruit benedici, Urkunde xlix. -- M. 1845.]

A prophecy, or rather a summons, affixed on the church door of St.
George, was the first public evidence of his designs; a nocturnal
assembly of a hundred citizens on Mount Aventine, the first step to
their execution. After an oath of secrecy and aid, he represented to the
conspirators the importance and facility of their enterprise; that the
nobles, without union or resources, were strong only in the fear nobles,
of their imaginary strength; that all power, as well as right, was in
the hands of the people; that the revenues of the apostolical chamber
might relieve the public distress; and that the pope himself would
approve their victory over the common enemies of government and freedom.
After securing a faithful band to protect his first declaration, he
proclaimed through the city, by sound of trumpet, that on the evening of
the following day, all persons should assemble without arms before the
church of St. Angelo, to provide for the reestablishment of the good
estate. The whole night was employed in the celebration of thirty masses
of the Holy Ghost; and in the morning, Rienzi, bareheaded, but in
complete armor, issued from the church, encompassed by the hundred
conspirators. The pope's vicar, the simple bishop of Orvieto, who had
been persuaded to sustain a part in this singular ceremony, marched on
his right hand; and three great standards were borne aloft as the
emblems of their design. In the first, the banner of liberty, Rome was
seated on two lions, with a palm in one hand and a globe in the other;
St. Paul, with a drawn sword, was delineated in the banner of justice;
and in the third, St. Peter held the keys of concordand peace. Rienzi
was encouraged by the presence and applause of an innumerable crowd, who
understood little, and hoped much; and the procession slowly rolled
forwards from the castle of St. Angelo to the Capitol. His triumph was
disturbed by some secret emotions which he labored to suppress: he
ascended without opposition, and with seeming confidence, the citadel of
the republic; harangued the people from the balcony; and received the
most flattering confirmation of his acts and laws. The nobles, as if
destitute of arms and counsels, beheld in silent consternation this
strange revolution; and the moment had been prudently chosen, when the
most formidable, Stephen Colonna, was absent from the city. On the first
rumor, he returned to his palace, affected to despise this plebeian
tumult, and declared to the messenger of Rienzi, that at his leisure he
would cast the madman from the windows of the Capitol. The great bell
instantly rang an alarm, and so rapid was the tide, so urgent was the
danger, that Colonna escaped with precipitation to the suburb of St.
Laurence: from thence, after a moment's refreshment, he continued the
same speedy career till he reached in safety his castle of Palestrina;
lamenting his own imprudence, which had not trampled the spark of this
mighty conflagration. A general and peremptory order was issued from the
Capitol to all the nobles, that they should peaceably retire to their
estates: they obeyed; and their departure secured the tranquillity of
the free and obedient citizens of Rome.

But such voluntary obedience evaporates with the first transports of
zeal; and Rienzi felt the importance of justifying his usurpation by a
regular form and a legal title. At his own choice, the Roman people
would have displayed their attachment and authority, by lavishing on his
head the names of senator or consul, of king or emperor: he preferred
the ancient and modest appellation of tribune; ^* the protection of the
commons was the essence of that sacred office; and they were ignorant,
that it had never been invested with any share in the legislative or
executive powers of the republic. In this character, and with the
consent of the Roman, the tribune enacted the most salutary laws for the
restoration and maintenance of the good estate. By the first he fulfils
the wish of honesty and inexperience, that no civil suit should be
protracted beyond the term of fifteen days. The danger of frequent
perjury might justify the pronouncing against a false accuser the same
penalty which his evidence would have inflicted: the disorders of the
times might compel the legislator to punish every homicide with death,
and every injury with equal retaliation. But the execution of justice
was hopeless till he had previously abolished the tyranny of the nobles.
It was formally provided, that 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 harbor 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; ^26 and scandalous 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 allegiance 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, 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 a heavy forfeiture the annual duty of confession and
communion; and strictly guarded the spiritual as well as temporal
welfare of his faithful people. ^27

[Footnote *: Et ego, Deo semper auctore, ipsa die pristinâ(leg. primâ)
Tribunatus, quæquidem dignitas a tempore deflorati Imperii, et per annos
Voet ultra sub tyrannicàoccupatione vacavit, ipsos omnes potentes
indifferenter Deum at justitiam odientes, a meâ, ymo a Dei facie
fugiendo vehementi Spiritu dissipavi, et nullo effuso cruore trementes
expuli, sine ictu remanente Romane terre facie renovatâ. Libellus
Tribuni ad Cæsarem, p. xxxiv. -- M. 1845.]

[Footnote 26: In one MS. I read (l. ii. c. 4, p. 409) perfumante quatro
solli, in another, quatro florini, 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.]

[Footnote 27: Hocsemius, p. 498, apud du Cerçeau, Hist. de Rienzi, p.
194. The fifteen tribunitian laws may be found in the Roman historian
(whom for brevity I shall name) Fortifiocca, l. ii. c. 4.]

Chapter LXX: Final Settlement Of The Ecclesiastical State. -- Part II.

Never perhaps has the energy and effect of a single 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 a criminal. A mule,
with a jar of oil, had been stolen 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
rigor 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 acts of violence and
rapine, had pillaged a shipwrecked vessel at the mouth of the Tyber. ^28
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: stripped 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 labors and
rewards of industry spontaneously revive: Rome was still the metropolis
of the Christian world; and the fame and fortunes of the tribune were
diffused in every country by the strangers who had enjoyed the blessings
of his government.

[Footnote 28: Fortifiocca, l. 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
naria less skilful than those of Sicily and Genoa. 3. The navigation
from Marseilles was a coasting voyage 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.]

The deliverance of his country inspired Rienzi with a vast, and perhaps
visionary, idea of uniting Italy in a great federative 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. ^29 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: ^30 her guilt or
innocence was pleaded in a solemn trial at Rome; but after hearing the
advocates, ^31 the tribune adjourned this weighty 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 the private
friend, perhaps the secret counsellor, of Rienzi: 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-laureate 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.
^32

[Footnote 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.]

[Footnote 30: See the causes, circumstances, and effects of the death of
Andrew in Giannone, (tom. iii. l. xxiii. p. 220--229,) and the Life of
Petrarch (Mémoires, tom. ii. p. 143--148, 245--250, 375--379, notes, p.
21--37.) The abbéde Sade wishesto extenuate her guilt.]

[Footnote 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 susceptus, et excusatio subsequens, necis viri tui
te probant fuisse participem et consortem. Jane of Naples, and Mary of
Scotland, have a singular conformity.]

[Footnote *: In his letter to the archbishop of Prague, Rienzi thus
describes the effect of his elevation on Italy and on the world: "Did I
not restore real peace among the cities which were distracted by
factions? did I not cause all the citizens, exiled by party violence,
with their wretched wives and children, to be readmitted? had I not
begun to extinguish the factious names (scismatica nomina) of Guelf and
Ghibelline, for which countless thousands had perished body and soul,
under the eyes of their pastors, by the reduction of the city of Rome
and all Italy into one amicable, peaceful, holy, and united confederacy?
the consecrated standards and banners having been by me collected and
blended together, and, in witness to our holy association and perfect
union, offered up in the presence of the ambassadors of all the cities
of Italy, on the day of the assumption of our Blessed Lady." p. xlvii.

In the Libellus ad Cæsarem: "I received the homage and submission of all
the sovereigns of Apulia, the barons and counts, and almost all the
people of Italy. I was honored by solemn embassies and letters by the
emperor of Constantinople and the king of England. The queen of Naples
submitted herself and her kingdom to the protection of the tribune. The
king of Hungary, by two solemn embassies, brought his cause against his
queen and his nobles before my tribunal; and I venture to say further,
that the fame of the tribune alarmed the soldan of Babylon. When the
Christian pilgrims to the sepulchre of our Lord related to the Christian
and Jewish inhabitants of Jerusalem all the yet unheard-of and wonderful
circumstances of the reformation in Rome, both Jews and Christians
celebrated the event with unusual festivities. When the soldan inquired
the cause of these rejoicings, and received this intelligence about
Rome, he ordered all the havens and cities on the coast to be fortified,
and put in a state of defence," p. xxxv. -- M. 1845.]

[Footnote 32: See the Epistola Hortatoria de Capessenda Republica, from
Petrarch to Nicholas Rienzi, (Opp. p. 535--540,) and the vth eclogue or
pastoral, a perpetual and obscure allegory.]

While Petrarch indulged these prophetic visions, the Roman hero was fast
declining from the meridian of 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 cruelly, 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;
^33 and that as often as they visited the city on foot, a single viator,
or beadle, attended the exercise of their office. The Gracchi would have
frowned or smiled, could they have read the sonorous titles and epithets
of their successor, "Nicholas, severe and merciful; deliverer of Rome;
defender of Italy; ^34 friend of mankind, and of liberty, peace, and
justice; tribune august:" his theatrical pageants had prepared the
revolution; but Rienzi abused, in luxury and pride, the political maxim
of speaking to the eyes, as well as the understanding, of the multitude.
From nature he had received the gift of a handsome person, ^35 till it
was swelled and disfigured by intemperance: and his propensity to
laughter was corrected in the magistrate by the affectation of gravity
and sternness. He was clothed, at least on public occasions, in a
party-colored robe of velvet or satin, lined with fur, and embroidered
with gold: the rod of justice, which he carried in his hand, was a
sceptre of polished steel, crowned with a globe and cross of gold, and
enclosing a small fragment of the true and holy wood. In his civil and
religious processions through the city, he rode on a white steed, the
symbol of royalty: the great banner of the republic, a sun with a circle
of stars, a dove with an olive branch, was displayed over his head; a
shower of gold and silver was scattered among the populace, fifty guards
with halberds encompassed his person; a troop of horse preceded his
march; and their tymbals and trumpets were of massy silver.

[Footnote *: An illustrious female writer has drawn, with a single
stroke, the character of Rienzi, Crescentius, and Arnold of Brescia, the
fond restorers of Roman liberty: 'Qui ont pris les souvenirs pour les
espérances.' Corinne, tom. i. p. 159. Could Tacitus have excelled this?"
Hallam, vol i p. 418. -- M.]

[Footnote 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
omoiousqai schmati, kai stolh kai diaithtoiV epitugcanousi tvn politvn .
. . . katapateisqai dei (a saying of C. Curio) kai mh semnon einai th
oyei mhde dusprosodon . . . osw de mallon ektapeinoutai tv swmati,
tosoutw mallon auxetai th dunamei, &c. Rienzi, and Petrarch himself,
were incapable perhaps of reading a Greek philosopher; but they might
have imbibed the same modest doctrines from their favorite Latins, Livy
and Valerius Maximus.]

[Footnote 34: I could not express in English the forcible, though
barbarous, title of ZelatorItaliæ, which Rienzi assumed.]

[Footnote 35: Era bell' homo, (l. ii. c. l. p. 399.) It is remarkable,
that the riso sarcastico of the Bracciano edition is wanting in the
Roman MS., from which Muratori has given the text. In his second reign,
when he is painted almost as a monster, Rienzi travea una ventresca
tonna trionfale, a modo de uno Abbate Asiano, or Asinino, (l. iii. c.
18, p. 523.)]

The ambition of the honors of chivalry ^36 betrayed the meanness of his
birth, and degraded the importance of his office; and the equestrian
tribune was not less odious to the nobles, whom he adopted, than to the
plebeians, whom he deserted. All that yet remained of treasure, or
luxury, or art, was exhausted on that solemn day. Rienzi led the
procession from the Capitol to the Lateran; the tediousness of the way
was relieved with decorations and games; the ecclesiastical, civil, and
military orders marched under their various banners; the Roman ladies
attended his wife; and the ambassadors of Italy might loudly applaud or
secretly deride the novelty of the pomp. In the evening, which they had
reached the church and palace of Constantine, he thanked and dismissed
the numerous assembly, with an invitation to the festival of the ensuing
day. From the hands of a venerable knight he received the order of the
Holy Ghost; the purification of the bath was a previous ceremony; but in
no step of his life did Rienzi excite such scandal and censure as by the
profane use of the porphyry vase, in which Constantine (a foolish
legend) had been healed of his leprosy by Pope Sylvester. ^37 With equal
presumption the tribune watched or reposed within the consecrated
precincts of the baptistery; and the failure of his state-bed was
interpreted as an omen of his approaching downfall. At the hour of
worship, he showed himself to the returning crowds in a majestic
attitude, with a robe of purple, his sword, and gilt spurs; but the holy
rites were soon interrupted by his levity and insolence. Rising from his
throne, and advancing towards the congregation, he proclaimed in a loud
voice: "We summon to our tribunal Pope Clement: and command him to
reside in his diocese of Rome: we also summon the sacred college of
cardinals. ^38 We again summon the two pretenders, Charles of Bohemia
and Lewis of Bavaria, who style themselves emperors: we likewise summon
all the electors of Germany, to inform us on what pretence they have
usurped the inalienable right of the Roman people, the ancient and
lawful sovereigns of the empire." ^39 Unsheathing his maiden sword, he
thrice brandished it to the three parts of the world, and thrice
repeated the extravagant declaration, "And this too is mine!" The pope's
vicar, the bishop of Orvieto, attempted to check this career of folly;
but his feeble protest was silenced by martial music; and instead of
withdrawing from the assembly, he consented to dine with his brother
tribune, at a table which had hitherto been reserved for the supreme
pontiff. A banquet, such as the Cæsars had given, was prepared for the
Romans. The apartments, porticos, and courts of the Lateran were spread
with innumerable tables for either sex, and every condition; a stream of
wine flowed from the nostrils of Constantine's brazen horse; no
complaint, except of the scarcity of water, could be heard; and the
licentiousness of the multitude was curbed by discipline and fear. A
subsequent day was appointed for the coronation of Rienzi; ^40 seven
crowns of different leaves or metals were successively placed on his
head by the most eminent of the Roman clergy; they represented the seven
gifts of the Holy Ghost; and he still professed to imitate the example
of the ancient tribunes. ^* These extraordinary spectacles might deceive
or flatter the people; and their own vanity was gratified in the vanity
of their leader. But in his private life he soon deviated from the
strict rule of frugality and abstinence; and the plebeians, who were
awed by the splendor of the nobles, were provoked by the luxury of their
equal. His wife, his son, his uncle, (a barber in name and profession,)
exposed the contrast of vulgar manners and princely expense; and without
acquiring the majesty, Rienzi degenerated into the vices, of a king.

[Footnote 36: Strange as it may seem, this festival was not without a
precedent. In the year 1327, two barons, a Colonna and an Ursini, the
usual balance, were created knights by the Roman people: their bath was
of rose-water, their beds were decked with royal magnificence, and they
were served at St. Maria of Araceli in the Capitol, by the twenty-eight
buoni huomini. They afterwards received from Robert, king of Naples, the
sword of chivalry, (Hist. Rom. l. i. c. 2, p. 259.)]

[Footnote 37: All parties believed in the leprosy and bath of
Constantine (Petrarch. Epist. Famil. vi. 2,) and Rienzi justified his
own conduct by observing to the court of Avignon, that a vase which had
been used by a Pagan could not be profaned by a pious Christian. Yet
this crime is specified in the bull of excommunication, (Hocsemius, apud
du Cerçeau, p. 189, 190.)]

[Footnote 38: This verbalsummons of Pope Clement VI., which rests on the
authority of the Roman historian and a Vatican MS., is disputed by the
biographer of Petrarch, (tom. ii. not. p. 70--76, with arguments rather
of decency than of weight. The court of Avignon might not choose to
agitate this delicate question.]

[Footnote 39: The summons of the two rival emperors, a monument of
freedom and folly, is extant in Hocsemius, (Cerçeau, p. 163--166.)]

[Footnote 40: It is singular, that the Roman historian should have
overlooked this sevenfold coronation, which is sufficiently proved by
internal evidence, and the testimony of Hocsemius, and even of Rienzi,
(Cercean p. 167--170, 229.)]

[Footnote *: It was on this occasion that he made the profane comparison
between himself and our Lord; and the striking circumstance took place
which he relates in his letter to the archbishop of Prague. In the midst
of all the wild and joyous exultation of the people, one of his most
zealous supporters, a monk, who was in high repute for his sanctity,
stood apart in a corner of the church and wept bitterly! A domestic
chaplain of Rienzi's inquired the cause of his grief. "Now," replied the
man of God, "is thy master cast down from heaven -- never saw I man so
proud. By the aid of the Holy Ghost he has driven the tyrants from the
city without drawing a sword; the cities and the sovereigns of Italy
have submitted to his power. Why is he so arrogant and ungrateful
towards the Most High? Why does he seek earthly and transitory rewards
for his labors, and in his wanton speech liken himself to the Creator?
Tell thy master that he can only atone for this offence by tears of
penitence." In the evening the chaplain communicated this solemn rebuke
to the tribune: it appalled him for the time, but was soon forgotten in
the tumult and hurry of business. -- M. 1845.]

A simple citizen describes with pity, or perhaps with pleasure, the
humiliation of the barons of Rome. "Bareheaded, their hands crossed on
their breast, they stood with downcast looks in the presence of the
tribune; and they trembled, good God, how they trembled!" ^41 As long as
the yoke of Rienzi was that of justice and their country, their
conscience forced them to esteem the man, whom pride and interest
provoked them to hate: his extravagant conduct soon fortified their
hatred by contempt; and they conceived the hope of subverting a power
which was no longer so deeply rooted in the public confidence. The old
animosity of the Colonna and Ursini was suspended for a moment by their
common disgrace: they associated their wishes, and perhaps their
designs; an assassin was seized and tortured; he accused the nobles; and
as soon as Rienzi deserved the fate, he adopted the suspicions and
maxims, of a tyrant. On the same day, under various pretences, he
invited to the Capitol his principal enemies, among whom were five
members of the Ursini and three of the Colonna name. But instead of a
council or a banquet, they found themselves prisoners under the sword of
despotism or justice; and the consciousness of innocence or guilt might
inspire them with equal apprehensions of danger. At the sound of the
great bell the people assembled; they were arraigned for a conspiracy
against the tribune's life; and though some might sympathize in their
distress, not a hand, nor a voice, was raised to rescue the first of the
nobility from their impending doom. Their apparent boldness was prompted
by despair; they passed in separate chambers a sleepless and painful
night; and the venerable hero, Stephen Colonna, striking against the
door of his prison, repeatedly urged his guards to deliver him by a
speedy death from such ignominious servitude. In the morning they
understood their sentence from the visit of a confessor and the tolling
of the bell. The great hall of the Capitol had been decorated for the
bloody scene with red and white hangings: the countenance of the tribune
was dark and severe; the swords of the executioners were unsheathed; and
the barons were interrupted in their dying speeches by the sound of
trumpets. But in this decisive moment, Rienzi was not less anxious or
apprehensive than his captives: he dreaded the splendor of their names,
their surviving kinsmen, the inconstancy of the people the reproaches of
the world, and, after rashly offering a mortal injury, he vainly
presumed that, if he could forgive, he might himself be forgiven. His
elaborate oration was that of a Christian and a suppliant; and, as the
humble minister of the commons, he entreated his masters to pardon these
noble criminals, for whose repentance and future service he pledged his
faith and authority. "If you are spared," said the tribune, "by the
mercy of the Romans, will you not promise to support the good estate
with your lives and fortunes?" Astonished by this marvellous clemency,
the barons bowed their heads; and while they devoutly repeated the oath
of allegiance, might whisper a secret, and more sincere, assurance of
revenge. A priest, in the name of the people, pronounced their
absolution: they received the communion with the tribune, assisted at
the banquet, followed the procession; and, after every spiritual and
temporal sign of reconciliation, were dismissed in safety to their
respective homes, with the new honors and titles of generals, consuls,
and patricians. ^42

[Footnote 41: Puoi se faceva stare denante a se, mentre sedeva, li
baroni tutti in piedi ritti co le vraccia piecate, e co li capucci
tratti. Deh como stavano paurosi! (Hist. Rom. l. ii. c. 20, p. 439.) He
saw them, and we see them.]

[Footnote 42: The original letter, in which Rienzi justifies his
treatment of the Colonna, (Hocsemius, apud du Cerçeau, p. 222--229,)
displays, in genuine colors, the mixture of the knave and the madman.]

During some weeks they were checked by the memory of their danger,
rather than of their deliverance, till the most powerful of the Ursini,
escaping with the Colonna from the city, erected at Marino the standard
of rebellion. The fortifications of the castle were instantly restored;
the vassals attended their lord; the outlaws armed against the
magistrate; the flocks and herds, the harvests and vineyards, from
Marino to the gates of Rome, were swept away or destroyed; and the
people arraigned Rienzi as the author of the calamities which his
government had taught them to forget. In the camp, Rienzi appeared to
less advantage than in the rostrum; and he neglected the progress of the
rebel barons till their numbers were strong, and their castles
impregnable. From the pages of Livy he had not imbibed the art, or even
the courage, of a general: an army of twenty thousand Romans returned
without honor or effect from the attack of Marino; and his vengeance was
amused by painting his enemies, their heads downwards, and drowning two
dogs (at least they should have been bears) as the representatives of
the Ursini. The belief of his incapacity encouraged their operations:
they were invited by their secret adherents; and the barons attempted,
with four thousand foot, and sixteen hundred horse, to enter Rome by
force or surprise. The city was prepared for their reception; the
alarm-bell rung all night; the gates were strictly guarded, or
insolently open; and after some hesitation they sounded a retreat. The
two first divisions had passed along the walls, but the prospect of a
free entrance tempted the headstrong valor of the nobles in the rear;
and after a successful skirmish, they were overthrown and massacred
without quarter by the crowds of the Roman people. Stephen Colonna the
younger, the noble spirit to whom Petrarch ascribed the restoration of
Italy, was preceded or accompanied in death by his son John, a gallant
youth, by his brother Peter, who might regret the ease and honors of the
church, by a nephew of legitimate birth, and by two bastards of the
Colonna race; and the number of seven, the seven crowns, as Rienzi
styled them, of the Holy Ghost, was completed by the agony of the
deplorable parent, and the veteran chief, who had survived the hope and
fortune of his house. The vision and prophecies of St. Martin and Pope
Boniface had been used by the tribune to animate his troops: ^43 he
displayed, at least in the pursuit, the spirit of a hero; but he forgot
the maxims of the ancient Romans, who abhorred the triumphs of civil
war. The conqueror ascended the Capitol; deposited his crown and sceptre
on the altar; and boasted, with some truth, that he had cut off an ear,
which neither pope nor emperor had been able to amputate. ^44 His base
and implacable revenge denied the honors of burial; and the bodies of
the Colonna, which he threatened to expose with those of the vilest
malefactors, were secretly interred by the holy virgins of their name
and family. ^45 The people sympathized in their grief, repented of their
own fury, and detested the indecent joy of Rienzi, who visited the spot
where these illustrious victims had fallen. It was on that fatal spot
that he conferred on his son the honor of knighthood: and the ceremony
was accomplished by a slight blow from each of the horsemen of the
guard, and by a ridiculous and inhuman ablution from a pool of water,
which was yet polluted with patrician blood. ^46

[Footnote 43: Rienzi, in the above-mentioned letter, ascribes to St.
Martin the tribune, Boniface VIII. the enemy of Colonna, himself, and
the Roman people, the glory of the day, which Villani likewise (l. 12,
c. 104) describes as a regular battle. The disorderly skirmish, the
flight of the Romans, and the cowardice of Rienzi, are painted in the
simple and minute narrative of Fortifiocca, or the anonymous citizen,
(l. i. c. 34--37.)]

[Footnote 44: In describing the fall of the Colonna, I speak only of the
family of Stephen the elder, who is often confounded by the P. du
Cerçeau with his son. That family was extinguished, but the house has
been perpetuated in the collateral branches, of which I have not a very
accurate knowledge. Circumspice (says Petrarch) familiætuæstatum,
Columniensium domos: solito pauciores habeat columnas. Quid ad rem modo
fundamentum stabile, solidumque permaneat.]

[Footnote 45: The convent of St. Silvester was founded, endowed, and
protected by the Colonna cardinals, for the daughters of the family who
embraced a monastic life, and who, in the year 1318, were twelve in
number. The others were allowed to marry with their kinsmen in the
fourth degree, and the dispensation was justified by the small number
and close alliances of the noble families of Rome, (Mémoires sur
Pétrarque, tom. i. p. 110, tom. ii. p. 401.)]

[Footnote 46: Petrarch wrote a stiff and pedantic letter of consolation,
(Fam. l. vii. epist. 13, p. 682, 683.) The friend was lost in the
patriot. Nulla toto orbe principum familia carior; carior tamen
respublica, carior Roma, carior Italia.

Je rends graces aux Dieux de n'être pas Romain.

11]

A short delay would have saved the Colonna, the delay of a single month,
which elapsed between the triumph and the exile of Rienzi. In the pride
of victory, he forfeited what yet remained of his civil virtues, without
acquiring the fame of military prowess. A free and vigorous opposition
was formed in the city; and when the tribune proposed in the public
council ^47 to impose a new tax, and to regulate the government of
Perugia, thirty-nine members voted against his measures; repelled the
injurious charge of treachery and corruption; and urged him to prove, by
their forcible exclusion, that if the populace adhered to his cause, it
was already disclaimed by the most respectable citizens. The pope and
the sacred college had never been dazzled by his specious professions;
they were justly offended by the insolence of his conduct; a cardinal
legate was sent to Italy, and after some fruitless treaty, and two
personal interviews, he fulminated a bull of excommunication, in which
the tribune is degraded from his office, and branded with the guilt of
rebellion, sacrilege, and heresy. ^48 The surviving barons of Rome were
now humbled to a sense of allegiance; their interest and revenge engaged
them in the service of the church; but as the fate of the Colonna was
before their eyes, they abandoned to a private adventurer the peril and
glory of the revolution. John Pepin, count of Minorbino, ^49 in the
kingdom of Naples, had been condemned for his crimes, or his riches, to
perpetual imprisonment; and Petrarch, by soliciting his release,
indirectly contributed to the ruin of his friend. At the head of one
hundred and fifty soldiers, the count of Minorbino introduced himself
into Rome; barricaded the quarter of the Colonna: and found the
enterprise as easy as it had seemed impossible. From the first alarm,
the bell of the Capitol incessantly tolled; but, instead of repairing to
the well-known sound, the people were silent and inactive; and the
pusillanimous Rienzi, deploring their ingratitude with sighs and tears,
abdicated the government and palace of the republic.

[Footnote 47: This council and opposition is obscurely mentioned by
Pollistore, a contemporary writer, who has preserved some curious and
original facts, (Rer. Italicarum, tom. xxv. c. 31, p. 798--804.)]

[Footnote 48: The briefs and bulls of Clement VI. against Rienzi are
translated by the P. du Cerçeau, (p. 196, 232,) from the Ecclesiastical
Annals of Odericus Raynaldus, (A.D. 1347, No. 15, 17, 21, &c.,) who
found them in the archives of the Vatican.]

[Footnote 49: Matteo Villani describes the origin, character, and death
of this count of Minorbino, a man da natura inconstante e senza fede,
whose grandfather, a crafty notary, was enriched and ennobled by the
spoils of the Saracens of Nocera, (l. vii. c. 102, 103.) See his
imprisonment, and the efforts of Petrarch, tom. ii. p. 149--151.)]

Chapter LXX: Final Settlement Of The Ecclesiastical State. -- Part III.

Without drawing his sword, count Pepin restored the aristocracy and the
church; three senators were chosen, and the legate, assuming the first
rank, accepted his two colleagues from the rival families of Colonna and
Ursini. The acts of the tribune were abolished, his head was proscribed;
yet such was the terror of his name, that the barons hesitated three
days before they would trust themselves in the city, and Rienzi was left
above a month in the castle of St. Angelo, from whence he peaceably
withdrew, after laboring, without effect, to revive the affection and
courage of the Romans. The vision of freedom and empire had vanished:
their fallen spirit would have acquiesced in servitude, had it been
smoothed by tranquillity and order; and it was scarcely observed, that
the new senators derived their authority from the Apostolic See; that
four cardinals were appointed to reform, with dictatorial power, the
state of the republic. Rome was again agitated by the bloody feuds of
the barons, who detested each other, and despised the commons: their
hostile fortresses, both in town and country, again rose, and were again
demolished: and the peaceful citizens, a flock of sheep, were devoured,
says the Florentine historian, by these rapacious wolves. But when their
pride and avarice had exhausted the patience of the Romans, a
confraternity of the Virgin Mary protected or avenged the republic: the
bell of the Capitol was again tolled, the nobles in arms trembled in the
presence of an unarmed multitude; and of the two senators, Colonna
escaped from the window of the palace, and Ursini was stoned at the foot
of the altar. The dangerous office of tribune was successively occupied
by two plebeians, Cerroni and Baroncelli. The mildness of Cerroni was
unequal to the times; and after a faint struggle, he retired with a fair
reputation and a decent fortune to the comforts of rural life. Devoid of
eloquence or genius, Baroncelli was distinguished by a resolute spirit:
he spoke the language of a patriot, and trod in the footsteps of
tyrants; his suspicion was a sentence of death, and his own death was
the reward of his cruelties. Amidst the public misfortunes, the faults
of Rienzi were forgotten; and the Romans sighed for the peace and
prosperity of their good estate. ^50

[Footnote 50: The troubles of Rome, from the departure to the return of
Rienzi, are related by Matteo Villani (l. ii. c. 47, l. iii. c. 33, 57,
78) and Thomas Fortifiocca, (l. iii. c. 1--4.) I have slightly passed
over these secondary characters, who imitated the original tribune.]

After an exile of seven years, the first deliverer was again restored to
his country. In the disguise of a monk or a pilgrim, he escaped from the
castle of St. Angelo, implored the friendship of the king of Hungary at
Naples, tempted the ambition of every bold adventurer, mingled at Rome
with the pilgrims of the jubilee, lay concealed among the hermits of the
Apennine, and wandered through the cities of Italy, Germany, and
Bohemia. His person was invisible, his name was yet formidable; and the
anxiety of the court of Avignon supposes, and even magnifies, his
personal merit. The emperor Charles the Fourth gave audience to a
stranger, who frankly revealed himself as the tribune of the republic;
and astonished an assembly of ambassadors and princes, by the eloquence
of a patriot and the visions of a prophet, the downfall of tyranny and
the kingdom of the Holy Ghost. ^51 Whatever had been his hopes, Rienzi
found himself a captive; but he supported a character of independence
and dignity, and obeyed, as his own choice, the irresistible summons of
the supreme pontiff. The zeal of Petrarch, which had been cooled by the
unworthy conduct, was rekindled by the sufferings and the presence, of
his friend; and he boldly complains of the times, in which the savior of
Rome was delivered by her emperor into the hands of her bishop. Rienzi
was transported slowly, but in safe custody, from Prague to Avignon: his
entrance into the city was that of a malefactor; in his prison he was
chained by the leg; and four cardinals were named to inquire into the
crimes of heresy and rebellion. But his trial and condemnation would
have involved some questions, which it was more prudent to leave under
the veil of mystery: the temporal supremacy of the popes; the duty of
residence; the civil and ecclesiastical privileges of the clergy and
people of Rome. The reigning pontiff well deserved the appellation of
Clement: the strange vicissitudes and magnanimous spirit of the captive
excited his pity and esteem; and Petrarch believes that he respected in
the hero the name and sacred character of a poet. ^52 Rienzi was
indulged with an easy confinement and the use of books; and in the
assiduous study of Livy and the Bible, he sought the cause and the
consolation of his misfortunes.

[Footnote 51: These visions, of which the friends and enemies of Rienzi
seem alike ignorant, are surely magnified by the zeal of Pollistore, a
Dominican inquisitor, (Rer. Ital. tom. xxv. c. 36, p. 819.) Had the
tribune taught, that Christ was succeeded by the Holy Ghost, that the
tyranny of the pope would be abolished, he might have been convicted of
heresy and treason, without offending the Roman people. *

Note: * So far from having magnified these visions, Pollistore is more
than confirmed by the documents published by Papencordt. The adoption of
all the wild doctrines of the Fratricelli, the Spirituals, in which, for
the time at least, Rienzi appears to have been in earnest; his
magnificent offers to the emperor, and the whole history of his life,
from his first escape from Rome to his imprisonment at Avignon, are
among the most curious chapters of his eventful life. -- M. 1845.]

[Footnote 52: The astonishment, the envy almost, of Petrarch is a proof,
if not of the truth of this incredible fact, at least of his own
veracity. The abbéde Sade (Mémoires, tom. iii. p. 242) quotes the vith
epistle of the xiiith book of Petrarch, but it is of the royal MS.,
which he consulted, and not of the ordinary Basil edition, (p. 920.)]

The succeeding pontificate of Innocent the Sixth opened a new prospect
of his deliverance and restoration; and the court of Avignon was
persuaded, that the successful rebel could alone appease and reform the
anarchy of the metropolis. After a solemn profession of fidelity, the
Roman tribune was sent into Italy, with the title of senator; but the
death of Baroncelli appeared to supersede the use of his mission; and
the legate, Cardinal Albornoz, ^53 a consummate statesman, allowed him
with reluctance, and without aid, to undertake the perilous experiment.
His first reception was equal to his wishes: the day of his entrance was
a public festival; and his eloquence and authority revived the laws of
the good estate. But this momentary sunshine was soon clouded by his own
vices and those of the people: in the Capitol, he might often regret the
prison of Avignon; and after a second administration of four months,
Rienzi was massacred in a tumult which had been fomented by the Roman
barons. In the society of the Germans and Bohemians, he is said to have
contracted the habits of intemperance and cruelty: adversity had chilled
his enthusiasm, without fortifying his reason or virtue; and that
youthful hope, that lively assurance, which is the pledge of success,
was now succeeded by the cold impotence of distrust and despair. The
tribune had reigned with absolute dominion, by the choice, and in the
hearts, of the Romans: the senator was the servile minister of a foreign
court; and while he was suspected by the people, he was abandoned by the
prince. The legate Albornoz, who seemed desirous of his ruin, inflexibly
refused all supplies of men and money; a faithful subject could no
longer presume to touch the revenues of the apostolical chamber; and the
first idea of a tax was the signal of clamor and sedition. Even his
justice was tainted with the guilt or reproach of selfish cruelty: the
most virtuous citizen of Rome was sacrificed to his jealousy; and in the
execution of a public robber, from whose purse he had been assisted, the
magistrate too much forgot, or too much remembered, the obligations of
the debtor. ^54 A civil war exhausted his treasures, and the patience of
the city: the Colonna maintained their hostile station at Palestrina;
and his mercenaries soon despised a leader whose ignorance and fear were
envious of all subordinate merit. In the death, as in the life, of
Rienzi, the hero and the coward were strangely mingled. When the Capitol
was invested by a furious multitude, when he was basely deserted by his
civil and military servants, the intrepid senator, waving the banner of
liberty, presented himself on the balcony, addressed his eloquence to
the various passions of the Romans, and labored to persuade them, that
in the same cause himself and the republic must either stand or fall.
His oration was interrupted by a volley of imprecations and stones; and
after an arrow had transpierced his hand, he sunk into abject despair,
and fled weeping to the inner chambers, from whence he was let down by a
sheet before the windows of the prison. Destitute of aid or hope, he was
besieged till the evening: the doors of the Capitol were destroyed with
axes and fire; and while the senator attempted to escape in a plebeian
habit, he was discovered and dragged to the platform of the palace, the
fatal scene of his judgments and executions. A whole hour, without voice
or motion, he stood amidst the multitude half naked and half dead: their
rage was hushed into curiosity and wonder: the last feelings of
reverence and compassion yet struggled in his favor; and they might have
prevailed, if a bold assassin had not plunged a dagger in his breast. He
fell senseless with the first stroke: the impotent revenge of his
enemies inflicted a thousand wounds: and the senator's body was
abandoned to the dogs, to the Jews, and to the flames. Posterity will
compare the virtues and failings of this extraordinary man; but in a
long period of anarchy and servitude, the name of Rienzi has often been
celebrated as the deliverer of his country, and the last of the Roman
patriots. ^55

[Footnote 53: Ægidius, or Giles Albornoz, a noble Spaniard, archbishop
of Toledo, and cardinal legate in Italy, (A.D. 1353--1367,) restored, by
his arms and counsels, the temporal dominion of the popes. His life has
been separately written by Sepulveda; but Dryden could not reasonably
suppose, that his name, or that of Wolsey, had reached the ears of the
Mufti in Don Sebastian.]

[Footnote 54: From Matteo Villani and Fortifiocca, the P. du Cerçeau (p.
344--394) has extracted the life and death of the chevalier Montreal,
the life of a robber and the death of a hero. At the head of a free
company, the first that desolated Italy, he became rich and formidable
be had money in all the banks, -- 60,000 ducats in Padua alone.]

[Footnote 55: The exile, second government, and death of Rienzi, are
minutely related by the anonymous Roman, who appears neither his friend
nor his enemy, (l. iii. c. 12--25.) Petrarch, who loved the tribune, was
indifferent to the fate of the senator.]

The first and most generous wish of Petrarch was the restoration of a
free republic; but after the exile and death of his plebeian hero, he
turned his eyes from the tribune, to the king, of the Romans. The
Capitol was yet stained with the blood of Rienzi, when Charles the
Fourth descended from the Alps to obtain the Italian and Imperial
crowns. In his passage through Milan he received the visit, and repaid
the flattery, of the poet-laureate; accepted a medal of Augustus; and
promised, without a smile, to imitate the founder of the Roman monarchy.
A false application of the name and maxims of antiquity was the source
of the hopes and disappointments of Petrarch; yet he could not overlook
the difference of times and characters; the immeasurable distance
between the first Cæsars and a Bohemian prince, who by the favor of the
clergy had been elected the titular head of the German aristocracy.
Instead of restoring to Rome her glory and her provinces, he had bound
himself by a secret treaty with the pope, to evacuate the city on the
day of his coronation; and his shameful retreat was pursued by the
reproaches of the patriot bard. ^56

[Footnote 56: The hopes and the disappointment of Petrarch are agreeably
described in his own words by the French biographer, (Mémoires, tom.
iii. p. 375--413;) but the deep, though secret, wound was the coronation
of Zanubi, the poet-laureate, by Charles IV.]

After the loss of liberty and empire, his third and more humble wish was
to reconcile the shepherd with his flock; to recall the Roman bishop to
his ancient and peculiar diocese. In the fervor of youth, with the
authority of age, Petrarch addressed his exhortations to five successive
popes, and his eloquence was always inspired by the enthusiasm of
sentiment and the freedom of language. ^57 The son of a citizen of
Florence invariably preferred the country of his birth to that of his
education; and Italy, in his eyes, was the queen and garden of the
world. Amidst her domestic factions, she was doubtless superior to
France both in art and science, in wealth and politeness; but the
difference could scarcely support the epithet of barbarous, which he
promiscuously bestows on the countries beyond the Alps. Avignon, the
mystic Babylon, the sink of vice and corruption, was the object of his
hatred and contempt; but he forgets that her scandalous vices were not
the growth of the soil, and that in every residence they would adhere to
the power and luxury of the papal court. He confesses that the successor
of St. Peter is the bishop of the universal church; yet it was not on
the banks of the Rhône, but of the Tyber, that the apostle had fixed his
everlasting throne; and while every city in the Christian world was
blessed with a bishop, the metropolis alone was desolate and forlorn.
Since the removal of the Holy See, the sacred buildings of the Lateran
and the Vatican, their altars and their saints, were left in a state of
poverty and decay; and Rome was often painted under the image of a
disconsolate matron, as if the wandering husband could be reclaimed by
the homely portrait of the age and infirmities of his weeping spouse.
^58 But the cloud which hung over the seven hills would be dispelled by
the presence of their lawful sovereign: eternal fame, the prosperity of
Rome, and the peace of Italy, would be the recompense of the pope who
should dare to embrace this generous resolution. Of the five whom
Petrarch exhorted, the three first, John the Twenty-second, Benedict the
Twelfth, and Clement the Sixth, were importuned or amused by the
boldness of the orator; but the memorable change which had been
attempted by Urban the Fifth was finally accomplished by Gregory the
Eleventh. The execution of their design was opposed by weighty and
almost insuperable obstacles. A king of France, who has deserved the
epithet of wise, was unwilling to release them from a local dependence:
the cardinals, for the most part his subjects, were attached to the
language, manners, and climate of Avignon; to their stately palaces;
above all, to the wines of Burgundy. In their eyes, Italy was foreign or
hostile; and they reluctantly embarked at Marseilles, as if they had
been sold or banished into the land of the Saracens. Urban the Fifth
resided three years in the Vatican with safety and honor: his sanctity
was protected by a guard of two thousand horse; and the king of Cyprus,
the queen of Naples, and the emperors of the East and West, devoutly
saluted their common father in the chair of St. Peter. But the joy of
Petrarch and the Italians was soon turned into grief and indignation.
Some reasons of public or private moment, his own impatience or the
prayers of the cardinals, recalled Urban to France; and the approaching
election was saved from the tyrannic patriotism of the Romans. The
powers of heaven were interested in their cause: Bridget of Sweden, a
saint and pilgrim, disapproved the return, and foretold the death, of
Urban the Fifth: the migration of Gregory the Eleventh was encouraged by
St. Catharine of Sienna, the spouse of Christ and ambassadress of the
Florentines; and the popes themselves, the great masters of human
credulity, appear to have listened to these visionary females. ^59 Yet
those celestial admonitions were supported by some arguments of temporal
policy. The residents of Avignon had been invaded by hostile violence:
at the head of thirty thousand robbers, a hero had extorted ransom and
absolution from the vicar of Christ and the sacred college; and the
maxim of the French warriors, to spare the people and plunder the
church, was a new heresy of the most dangerous import. ^60 While the
pope was driven from Avignon, he was strenuously invited to Rome. The
senate and people acknowledged him as their lawful sovereign, and laid
at his feet the keys of the gates, the bridges, and the fortresses; of
the quarter at least beyond the Tyber. ^61 But this loyal offer was
accompanied by a declaration, that they could no longer suffer the
scandal and calamity of his absence; and that his obstinacy would
finally provoke them to revive and assert the primitive right of
election. The abbot of Mount Cassin had been consulted, whether he would
accept the triple crown ^62 from the clergy and people: "I am a citizen
of Rome," ^63 replied that venerable ecclesiastic, "and my first law is,
the voice of my country." ^64

[Footnote 57: See, in his accurate and amusing biographer, the
application of Petrarch and Rome to Benedict XII. in the year 1334,
(Mémoires, tom. i. p. 261--265,) to Clement VI. in 1342, (tom. ii. p.
45--47,) and to Urban V. in 1366, (tom. iii. p. 677--691:) his praise
(p. 711--715) and excuse (p. 771) of the last of these pontiffs. His
angry controversy on the respective merits of France and Italy may be
found, Opp. p. 1068--1085.]

[Footnote 58:

Squalida sed quoniam facies, neglectaque cultû

Cæsaries; multisque malis lassata senectus

Eripuit solitam effigiem: vetus accipe nomen;

Roma vocor.  (Carm. l. 2, p. 77.)

He spins this allegory beyond all measure or patience. The Epistles to
Urban V in prose are more simple and persuasive, (Senilium, l. vii. p.
811--827 l. ix. epist. i. p. 844--854.)]

[Footnote 59: I have not leisure to expatiate on the legends of St.
Bridget or St. Catharine, the last of which might furnish some amusing
stories. Their effect on the mind of Gregory XI. is attested by the last
solemn words of the dying pope, who admonished the assistants, ut
caverent ab hominibus, sive viris, sive mulieribus, sub specie
religionis loquentibus visiones sui capitis, quia per tales ipse
seductus, &c., (Baluz. Not ad Vit. Pap. Avenionensium, tom. i. p.
1224.)]

[Footnote 60: This predatory expedition is related by Froissard,
(Chronique, tom. i. p. 230,) and in the life of Du Guesclin, (Collection
Générale des Mémoires Historiques, tom. iv. c. 16, p. 107--113.) As
early as the year 1361, the court of Avignon had been molested by
similar freebooters, who afterwards passed the Alps, (Mémoires sur
Pétrarque, tom. iii. p. 563--569.)]

[Footnote 61: Fleury alleges, from the annals of Odericus Raynaldus, the
original treaty which was signed the 21st of December, 1376, between
Gregory XI. and the Romans, (Hist. Ecclés. tom. xx. p. 275.)]

[Footnote 62: The first crown or regnum (Ducange, Gloss. Latin. tom. v.
p. 702) on the episcopal mitre of the popes, is ascribed to the gift of
Constantine, or Clovis. The second was added by Boniface VIII., as the
emblem not only of a spiritual, but of a temporal, kingdom. The three
states of the church are represented by the triple crown which was
introduced by John XXII. or Benedict XII., (Mémoires sur Pétrarque, tom.
i. p. 258, 259.)]

[Footnote 63: Baluze (Not. ad Pap. Avenion. tom. i. p. 1194, 1195)
produces the original evidence which attests the threats of the Roman
ambassadors, and the resignation of the abbot of Mount Cassin, qui,
ultro se offerens, respondit se civem Romanum esse, et illud velle quod
ipsi vellent.]

[Footnote 64: The return of the popes from Avignon to Rome, and their
reception by the people, are related in the original lives of Urban V.
and Gregory XI., in Baluze (Vit. Paparum Avenionensium, tom. i. p.
363--486) and Muratori, (Script. Rer. Italicarum, tom. iii. P. i. p.
613--712.) In the disputes of the schism, every circumstance was
severely, though partially, scrutinized; more especially in the great
inquest, which decided the obedience of Castile, and to which Baluze, in
his notes, so often and so largely appeals from a MS. volume in the
Harley library, (p. 1281, &c.)]

If superstition will interpret an untimely death, ^65 if the merit of
counsels be judged from the event, the heavens may seem to frown on a
measure of such apparent season and propriety. Gregory the Eleventh did
not survive above fourteen months his return to the Vatican; and his
decease was followed by the great schism of the West, which distracted
the Latin church above forty years. The sacred college was then composed
of twenty-two cardinals: six of these had remained at Avignon; eleven
Frenchmen, one Spaniard, and four Italians, entered the conclave in the
usual form. Their choice was not yet limited to the purple; and their
unanimous votes acquiesced in the archbishop of Bari, a subject of
Naples, conspicuous for his zeal and learning, who ascended the throne
of St. Peter under the name of Urban the Sixth. The epistle of the
sacred college affirms his free, and regular, election; which had been
inspired, as usual, by the Holy Ghost; he was adored, invested, and
crowned, with the customary rites; his temporal authority was obeyed at
Rome and Avignon, and his ecclesiastical supremacy was acknowledged in
the Latin world. During several weeks, the cardinals attended their new
master with the fairest professions of attachment and loyalty; till the
summer heats permitted a decent escape from the city. But as soon as
they were united at Anagni and Fundi, in a place of security, they cast
aside the mask, accused their own falsehood and hypocrisy,
excommunicated the apostate and antichrist of Rome, and proceeded to a
new election of Robert of Geneva, Clement the Seventh, whom they
announced to the nations as the true and rightful vicar of Christ. Their
first choice, an involuntary and illegal act, was annulled by fear of
death and the menaces of the Romans; and their complaint is justified by
the strong evidence of probability and fact. The twelve French
cardinals, above two thirds of the votes, were masters of the election;
and whatever might be their provincial jealousies, it cannot fairly be
presumed that they would have sacrificed their right and interest to a
foreign candidate, who would never restore them to their native country.
In the various, and often inconsistent, narratives, ^66 the shades of
popular violence are more darkly or faintly colored: but the
licentiousness of the seditious Romans was inflamed by a sense of their
privileges, and the danger of a second emigration. The conclave was
intimidated by the shouts, and encompassed by the arms, of thirty
thousand rebels; the bells of the Capitol and St. Peter's rang an alarm:
"Death, or an Italian pope!" was the universal cry; the same threat was
repeated by the twelve bannerets or chiefs of the quarters, in the form
of charitable advice; some preparations were made for burning the
obstinate cardinals; and had they chosen a Transalpine subject, it is
probable that they would never have departed alive from the Vatican. The
same constraint imposed the necessity of dissembling in the eyes of Rome
and of the world; the pride and cruelty of Urban presented a more
inevitable danger; and they soon discovered the features of the tyrant,
who could walk in his garden and recite his breviary, while he heard
from an adjacent chamber six cardinals groaning on the rack. His
inflexible zeal, which loudly censured their luxury and vice, would have
attached them to the stations and duties of their parishes at Rome; and
had he not fatally delayed a new promotion, the French cardinals would
have been reduced to a helpless minority in the sacred college. For
these reasons, and the hope of repassing the Alps, they rashly violated
the peace and unity of the church; and the merits of their double choice
are yet agitated in the Catholic schools. ^67 The vanity, rather than
the interest, of the nation determined the court and clergy of France.
^68 The states of Savoy, Sicily, Cyprus, Arragon, Castille, Navarre, and
Scotland were inclined by their example and authority to the obedience
of Clement the Seventh, and after his decease, of Benedict the
Thirteenth. Rome and the principal states of Italy, Germany, Portugal,
England, ^69 the Low Countries, and the kingdoms of the North, adhered
to the prior election of Urban the Sixth, who was succeeded by Boniface
the Ninth, Innocent the Seventh, and Gregory the Twelfth.

[Footnote 65: Can the death of a good man be esteemed a punishment by
those who believe in the immortality of the soul? They betray the
instability of their faith. Yet as a mere philosopher, I cannot agree
with the Greeks, on oi Jeoi jilousin apoqnhskei neoV, (Brunck,
PoetæGnomici, p. 231.) See in Herodotus (l. i. c. 31) the moral and
pleasing tale of the Argive youths.]

[Footnote 66: In the first book of the Histoire du Concile de Pise, M.
Lenfant has abridged and compared the original narratives of the
adherents of Urban and Clement, of the Italians and Germans, the French
and Spaniards. The latter appear to be the most active and loquacious,
and every fact and word in the original lives of Gregory XI. and Clement
VII. are supported in the notes of their editor Baluze.]

[Footnote 67: The ordinal numbers of the popes seems to decide the
question against Clement VII. and Benedict XIII., who are boldly
stigmatized as antipopes by the Italians, while the French are content
with authorities and reasons to plead the cause of doubt and toleration,
(Baluz. in Præfat.) It is singular, or rather it is not singular, that
saints, visions and miracles should be common to both parties.]

[Footnote 68: Baluze strenuously labors (Not. p. 1271--1280) to justify
the pure and pious motives of Charles V. king of France: he refused to
hear the arguments of Urban; but were not the Urbanists equally deaf to
the reasons of Clement, &c.?]

[Footnote 69: An epistle, or declamation, in the name of Edward III.,
(Baluz. Vit. Pap. Avenion. tom. i. p. 553,) displays the zeal of the
English nation against the Clementines. Nor was their zeal confined to
words: the bishop of Norwich led a crusade of 60,000 bigots beyond sea,
(Hume's History, vol. iii. p. 57, 58.)]

From the banks of the Tyber and the Rhône, the hostile pontiffs
encountered each other with the pen and the sword: the civil and
ecclesiastical order of society was disturbed; and the Romans had their
full share of the mischiefs of which they may be arraigned as the
primary authors. ^70 They had vainly flattered themselves with the hope
of restoring the seat of the ecclesiastical monarchy, and of relieving
their poverty with the tributes and offerings of the nations; but the
separation of France and Spain diverted the stream of lucrative
devotion; nor could the loss be compensated by the two jubilees which
were crowded into the space of ten years. By the avocations of the
schism, by foreign arms, and popular tumults, Urban the Sixth and his
three successors were often compelled to interrupt their residence in
the Vatican. The Colonna and Ursini still exercised their deadly feuds:
the bannerets of Rome asserted and abused the privileges of a republic:
the vicars of Christ, who had levied a military force, chastised their
rebellion with the gibbet, the sword, and the dagger; and, in a friendly
conference, eleven deputies of the people were perfidiously murdered and
cast into the street. Since the invasion of Robert the Norman, the
Romans had pursued their domestic quarrels without the dangerous
interposition of a stranger. But in the disorders of the schism, an
aspiring neighbor, Ladislaus king of Naples, alternately supported and
betrayed the pope and the people; by the former he was declared
gonfalonier, or general, of the church, while the latter submitted to
his choice the nomination of their magistrates. Besieging Rome by land
and water, he thrice entered the gates as a Barbarian conqueror;
profaned the altars, violated the virgins, pillaged the merchants,
performed his devotions at St. Peter's, and left a garrison in the
castle of St. Angelo. His arms were sometimes unfortunate, and to a
delay of three days he was indebted for his life and crown: but
Ladislaus triumphed in his turn; and it was only his premature death
that could save the metropolis and the ecclesiastical state from the
ambitious conqueror, who had assumed the title, or at least the powers,
of king of Rome. ^71

[Footnote 70: Besides the general historians, the Diaries of Delphinus
Gentilia Peter Antonius, and Stephen Infessura, in the great collection
of Muratori, represented the state and misfortunes of Rome.]

[Footnote 71: It is supposed by Giannone (tom. iii. p. 292) that he
styled himself Rex Romæ, a title unknown to the world since the
expulsion of Tarquin. But a nearer inspection has justified the reading
of Rex Ramæ, of Rama, an obscure kingdom annexed to the crown of
Hungary.]

I have not undertaken the ecclesiastical history of the schism; but
Rome, the object of these last chapters, is deeply interested in the
disputed succession of her sovereigns. The first counsels for the peace
and union of Christendom arose from the university of Paris, from the
faculty of the Sorbonne, whose doctors were esteemed, at least in the
Gallican church, as the most consummate masters of theological science.
^72 Prudently waiving all invidious inquiry into the origin and merits
of the dispute, they proposed, as a healing measure, that the two
pretenders of Rome and Avignon should abdicate at the same time, after
qualifying the cardinals of the adverse factions to join in a legitimate
election; and that the nations should subtract^73 their obedience, if
either of the competitor preferred his own interest to that of the
public. At each vacancy, these physicians of the church deprecated the
mischiefs of a hasty choice; but the policy of the conclave and the
ambition of its members were deaf to reason and entreaties; and
whatsoever promises were made, the pope could never be bound by the
oaths of the cardinal. During fifteen years, the pacific designs of the
university were eluded by the arts of the rival pontiffs, the scruples
or passions of their adherents, and the vicissitudes of French factions,
that ruled the insanity of Charles the Sixth. At length a vigorous
resolution was embraced; and a solemn embassy, of the titular patriarch
of Alexandria, two archbishops, five bishops, five abbots, three
knights, and twenty doctors, was sent to the courts of Avignon and Rome,
to require, in the name of the church and king, the abdication of the
two pretenders, of Peter de Luna, who styled himself Benedict the
Thirteenth, and of Angelo Corrario, who assumed the name of Gregory the
Twelfth. For the ancient honor of Rome, and the success of their
commission, the ambassadors solicited a conference with the magistrates
of the city, whom they gratified by a positive declaration, that the
most Christian king did not entertain a wish of transporting the holy
see from the Vatican, which he considered as the genuine and proper seat
of the successor of St. Peter. In the name of the senate and people, an
eloquent Roman asserted their desire to cooperate in the union of the
church, deplored the temporal and spiritual calamities of the long
schism, and requested the protection of France against the arms of the
king of Naples. The answers of Benedict and Gregory were alike edifying
and alike deceitful; and, in evading the demand of their abdication, the
two rivals were animated by a common spirit. They agreed on the
necessity of a previous interview; but the time, the place, and the
manner, could never be ascertained by mutual consent. "If the one
advances," says a servant of Gregory, "the other retreats; the one
appears an animal fearful of the land, the other a creature apprehensive
of the water. And thus, for a short remnant of life and power, will
these aged priests endanger the peace and salvation of the Christian
world." ^74

[Footnote 72: The leading and decisive part which France assumed in the
schism is stated by Peter du Puis in a separate history, extracted from
authentic records, and inserted in the seventh volume of the last and
best edition of his friend Thuanus, (P. xi. p. 110--184.)]

[Footnote 73: Of this measure, John Gerson, a stout doctor, was the
author of the champion. The proceedings of the university of Paris and
the Gallican church were often prompted by his advice, and are copiously
displayed in his theological writings, of which Le Clerc (Bibliothèque
Choisie, tom. x. p. 1--78) has given a valuable extract. John Gerson
acted an important part in the councils of Pisa and Constance.]

[Footnote 74: Leonardus Brunus Aretinus, one of the revivers of classic
learning in Italy, who, after serving many years as secretary in the
Roman court, retired to the honorable office of chancellor of the
republic of Florence, (Fabric. Bibliot. Medii Ævi, tom. i. p. 290.)
Lenfant has given the version of this curious epistle, (Concile de Pise,
tom. i. p. 192--195.)]

The Christian world was at length provoked by their obstinacy and fraud:
they were deserted by their cardinals, who embraced each other as
friends and colleagues; and their revolt was supported by a numerous
assembly of prelates and ambassadors. With equal justice, the council of
Pisa deposed the popes of Rome and Avignon; the conclave was unanimous
in the choice of Alexander the Fifth, and his vacant seat was soon
filled by a similar election of John the Twenty-third, the most
profligate of mankind. But instead of extinguishing the schism, the
rashness of the French and Italians had given a third pretender to the
chair of St. Peter. Such new claims of the synod and conclave were
disputed; three kings, of Germany, Hungary, and Naples, adhered to the
cause of Gregory the Twelfth; and Benedict the Thirteenth, himself a
Spaniard, was acknowledged by the devotion and patriotism of that
powerful nation. The rash proceedings of Pisa were corrected by the
council of Constance; the emperor Sigismond acted a conspicuous part as
the advocate or protector of the Catholic church; and the number and
weight of civil and ecclesiastical members might seem to constitute the
states-general of Europe. Of the three popes, John the Twenty-third was
the first victim: he fled and was brought back a prisoner: the most
scandalous charges were suppressed; the vicar of Christ was only accused
of piracy, murder, rape, sodomy, and incest; and after subscribing his
own condemnation, he expiated in prison the imprudence of trusting his
person to a free city beyond the Alps. Gregory the Twelfth, whose
obedience was reduced to the narrow precincts of Rimini, descended with
more honor from the throne; and his ambassador convened the session, in
which he renounced the title and authority of lawful pope. To vanquish
the obstinacy of Benedict the Thirteenth or his adherents, the emperor
in person undertook a journey from Constance to Perpignan. The kings of
Castile, Arragon, Navarre, and Scotland, obtained an equal and honorable
treaty; with the concurrence of the Spaniards, Benedict was deposed by
the council; but the harmless old man was left in a solitary castle to
excommunicate twice each day the rebel kingdoms which had deserted his
cause. After thus eradicating the remains of the schism, the synod of
Constance proceeded with slow and cautious steps to elect the sovereign
of Rome and the head of the church. On this momentous occasion, the
college of twenty-three cardinals was fortified with thirty deputies;
six of whom were chosen in each of the five great nations of
Christendom, -- the Italian, the German, the French, the Spanish, and
the English: ^75 the interference of strangers was softened by their
generous preference of an Italian and a Roman; and the hereditary, as
well as personal, merit of Otho Colonna recommended him to the conclave.
Rome accepted with joy and obedience the noblest of her sons; the
ecclesiastical state was defended by his powerful family; and the
elevation of Martin the Fifth is the æra of the restoration and
establishment of the popes in the Vatican. ^76

[Footnote 75: I cannot overlook this great national cause, which was
vigorously maintained by the English ambassadors against those of
France. The latter contended, that Christendom was essentially
distributed into the four great nations and votes, of Italy, Germany,
France, and Spain, and that the lesser kingdoms (such as England,
Denmark, Portugal, &c.) were comprehended under one or other of these
great divisions. The English asserted, that the British islands, of
which they were the head, should be considered as a fifth and coördinate
nation, with an equal vote; and every argument of truth or fable was
introduced to exalt the dignity of their country. Including England,
Scotland, Wales, the four kingdoms of Ireland, and the Orkneys, the
British Islands are decorated with eight royal crowns, and discriminated
by four or five languages, English, Welsh, Cornish, Scotch, Irish, &c.
The greater island from north to south measures 800 miles, or 40 days'
journey; and England alone contains 32 counties and 52,000 parish
churches, (a bold account!) besides cathedrals, colleges, priories, and
hospitals. They celebrate the mission of St. Joseph of Arimathea, the
birth of Constantine, and the legatine powers of the two primates,
without forgetting the testimony of Bartholomey de Glanville, (A.D.
1360,) who reckons only four Christian kingdoms, 1. of Rome, 2. of
Constantinople, 3. of Ireland, which had been transferred to the English
monarchs, and 4, of Spain. Our countrymen prevailed in the council, but
the victories of Henry V. added much weight to their arguments. The
adverse pleadings were found at Constance by Sir Robert Wingfield,
ambassador of Henry VIII. to the emperor Maximilian I., and by him
printed in 1517 at Louvain. From a Leipsic MS. they are more correctly
published in the collection of Von der Hardt, tom. v.; but I have only
seen Lenfant's abstract of these acts, (Concile de Constance, tom. ii.
p. 447, 453, &c.)]

[Footnote 76: The histories of the three successive councils, Pisa,
Constance, and Basil, have been written with a tolerable degree of
candor, industry, and elegance, by a Protestant minister, M. Lenfant,
who retired from France to Berlin. They form six volumes in quarto; and
as Basil is the worst, so Constance is the best, part of the
Collection.]

Chapter LXX: Final Settlement Of The Ecclesiastical State. -- Part IV.

The royal prerogative of coining money, which had been exercised near
three hundred years by the senate, was firstresumed by Martin the Fifth,
^77 and his image and superscription introduce the series of the papal
medals. Of his two immediate successors, Eugenius the Fourth was the
lastpope expelled by the tumults of the Roman people, ^78 and Nicholas
the Fifth, the lastwho was importuned by the presence of a Roman
emperor. ^79 I. The conflict of Eugenius with the fathers of Basil, and
the weight or apprehension of a new excise, emboldened and provoked the
Romans to usurp the temporal government of the city. They rose in arms,
elected seven governors of the republic, and a constable of the Capitol;
imprisoned the pope's nephew; besieged his person in the palace; and
shot volleys of arrows into his bark as he escaped down the Tyber in the
habit of a monk. But he still possessed in the castle of St. Angelo a
faithful garrison and a train of artillery: their batteries incessantly
thundered on the city, and a bullet more dexterously pointed broke down
the barricade of the bridge, and scattered with a single shot the heroes
of the republic. Their constancy was exhausted by a rebellion of five
months. Under the tyranny of the Ghibeline nobles, the wisest patriots
regretted the dominion of the church; and their repentance was unanimous
and effectual. The troops of St. Peter again occupied the Capitol; the
magistrates departed to their homes; the most guilty were executed or
exiled; and the legate, at the head of two thousand foot and four
thousand horse, was saluted as the father of the city. The synods of
Ferrara and Florence, the fear or resentment of Eugenius, prolonged his
absence: he was received by a submissive people; but the pontiff
understood from the acclamations of his triumphal entry, that to secure
their loyalty and his own repose, he must grant without delay the
abolition of the odious excise. II. Rome was restored, adorned, and
enlightened, by the peaceful reign of Nicholas the Fifth. In the midst
of these laudable occupations, the pope was alarmed by the approach of
Frederic the Third of Austria; though his fears could not be justified
by the character or the power of the Imperial candidate. After drawing
his military force to the metropolis, and imposing the best security of
oaths ^80 and treaties, Nicholas received with a smiling countenance the
faithful advocate and vassal of the church. So tame were the times, so
feeble was the Austrian, that the pomp of his coronation was
accomplished with order and harmony: but the superfluous honor was so
disgraceful to an independent nation, that his successors have excused
themselves from the toilsome pilgrimage to the Vatican; and rest their
Imperial title on the choice of the electors of Germany.

[Footnote 77: See the xxviith Dissertation of the Antiquities of
Muratori, and the 1st Instruction of the Science des Medailles of the
Père Joubert and the Baron de la Bastie. The Metallic History of Martin
V. and his successors has been composed by two monks, Moulinet, a
Frenchman, and Bonanni, an Italian: but I understand, that the first
part of the series is restored from more recent coins.]

[Footnote 78: Besides the Lives of Eugenius IV., (Rerum Italic. tom.
iii. P. i. p. 869, and tom. xxv. p. 256,) the Diaries of Paul Petroni
and Stephen Infessura are the best original evidence for the revolt of
the Romans against Eugenius IV. The former, who lived at the time and on
the spot, speaks the language of a citizen, equally afraid of priestly
and popular tyranny.]

[Footnote 79: The coronation of Frederic III. is described by Lenfant,
(Concile de Basle, tom. ii. p. 276--288,) from Æneas Sylvius, a
spectator and actor in that splendid scene.]

[Footnote 80: The oath of fidelity imposed on the emperor by the pope is
recorded and sanctified in the Clementines, (l. ii. tit. ix.;) and Æneas
Sylvius, who objects to this new demand, could not foresee, that in a
few years he should ascend the throne, and imbibe the maxims, of
Boniface VIII.]

A citizen has remarked, with pride and pleasure, that the king of the
Romans, after passing with a slight salute the cardinals and prelates
who met him at the gate, distinguished the dress and person of the
senator of Rome; and in this last farewell, the pageants of the empire
and the republic were clasped in a friendly embrace. ^81 According to
the laws of Rome, ^82 her first magistrate was required to be a doctor
of laws, an alien, of a place at least forty miles from the city; with
whose inhabitants he must not be connected in the third canonical degree
of blood or alliance. The election was annual: a severe scrutiny was
instituted into the conduct of the departing senator; nor could he be
recalled to the same office till after the expiration of two years. A
liberal salary of three thousand florins was assigned for his expense
and reward; and his public appearance represented the majesty of the
republic. His robes were of gold brocade or crimson velvet, or in the
summer season of a lighter silk: he bore in his hand an ivory sceptre;
the sound of trumpets announced his approach; and his solemn steps were
preceded at least by four lictors or attendants, whose red wands were
enveloped with bands or streamers of the golden color or livery of the
city. His oath in the Capitol proclaims his right and duty to observe
and assert the laws, to control the proud, to protect the poor, and to
exercise justice and mercy within the extent of his jurisdiction. In
these useful functions he was assisted by three learned strangers; the
two collaterals, and the judge of criminal appeals: their frequent
trials of robberies, rapes, and murders, are attested by the laws; and
the weakness of these laws connives at the licentiousness of private
feuds and armed associations for mutual defence. But the senator was
confined to the administration of justice: the Capitol, the treasury,
and the government of the city and its territory, were intrusted to the
three conservators, who were changed four times in each year: the
militia of the thirteen regions assembled under the banners of their
respective chiefs, or caporioni; and the first of these was
distinguished by the name and dignity of the prior. The popular
legislature consisted of the secret and the common councils of the
Romans. The former was composed of the magistrates and their immediate
predecessors, with some fiscal and legal officers, and three classes of
thirteen, twenty-six, and forty, counsellors: amounting in the whole to
about one hundred and twenty persons. In the common council all male
citizens had a right to vote; and the value of their privilege was
enhanced by the care with which any foreigners were prevented from
usurping the title and character of Romans. The tumult of a democracy
was checked by wise and jealous precautions: except the magistrates,
none could propose a question; none were permitted to speak, except from
an open pulpit or tribunal; all disorderly acclamations were suppressed;
the sense of the majority was decided by a secret ballot; and their
decrees were promulgated in the venerable name of the Roman senate and
people. It would not be easy to assign a period in which this theory of
government has been reduced to accurate and constant practice, since the
establishment of order has been gradually connected with the decay of
liberty. But in the year one thousand five hundred and eighty the
ancient statutes were collected, methodized in three books, and adapted
to present use, under the pontificate, and with the approbation, of
Gregory the Thirteenth: ^83 this civil and criminal code is the modern
law of the city; and, if the popular assemblies have been abolished, a
foreign senator, with the three conservators, still resides in the
palace of the Capitol. ^84 The policy of the Cæsars has been repeated by
the popes; and the bishop of Rome affected to maintain the form of a
republic, while he reigned with the absolute powers of a temporal, as
well as a spiritual, monarch.

[Footnote 81: Lo senatore di Roma, vestito di brocarto con quella
beretta, e con quelle maniche, et ornamenti di pelle, co' quali va alle
feste di Testaccio e Nagone, might escape the eye of Æneas Sylvius, but
he is viewed with admiration and complacency by the Roman citizen,
(Diario di Stephano Infessura, p. 1133.)]

[Footnote 82: See, in the statutes of Rome, the senator and three
judges, (l. i. c. 3--14,) the conservators, (l. i. c. 15, 16, 17, l.
iii. c. 4,) the caporioni(l. i. c. 18, l. iii. c. 8,) the secret
council, (l. iii. c. 2,) the common council, (l. iii. c. 3.) The title
of feuds, defiances, acts of violence, &c., is spread through many a
chapter (c. 14--40) of the second book.]

[Footnote 83: Statuta alm Urbis Rom Auctoritate S. D. N. Gregorii XIII
Pont. Max. a Senatu Populoque Rom. reformata et edita. Rom, 1580, in
folio. The obsolete, repugnant statutes of antiquity were confounded in
five books, and Lucas Pætus, a lawyer and antiquarian, was appointed to
act as the modern Tribonian. Yet I regret the old code, with the rugged
crust of freedom and barbarism.]

[Footnote 84: In my time (1765) and in M. Grosley's, (Observations sur
l'Italie torn. ii. p. 361,) the senator of Rome was M. Bielke, a noble
Swede and a proselyte to the Catholic faith. The pope's right to appoint
the senator and the conservator is implied, rather than affirmed, in the
statutes.]

It is an obvious truth, that the times must be suited to extraordinary
characters, and that the genius of Cromwell or Retz might now expire in
obscurity. The political enthusiasm of Rienzi had exalted him to a
throne; the same enthusiasm, in the next century, conducted his imitator
to the gallows. The birth of Stephen Porcaro was noble, his reputation
spotless: his tongue was armed with eloquence, his mind was enlightened
with learning; and he aspired, beyond the aim of vulgar ambition, to
free his country and immortalize his name. The dominion of priests is
most odious to a liberal spirit: every scruple was removed by the recent
knowledge of the fable and forgery of Constantine's donation; Petrarch
was now the oracle of the Italians; and as often as Porcaro revolved the
ode which describes the patriot and hero of Rome, he applied to himself
the visions of the prophetic bard. His first trial of the popular
feelings was at the funeral of Eugenius the Fourth: in an elaborate
speech he called the Romans to liberty and arms; and they listened with
apparent pleasure, till Porcaro was interrupted and answered by a grave
advocate, who pleaded for the church and state. By every law the
seditious orator was guilty of treason; but the benevolence of the new
pontiff, who viewed his character with pity and esteem, attempted by an
honorable office to convert the patriot into a friend. The inflexible
Roman returned from Anagni with an increase of reputation and zeal; and,
on the first opportunity, the games of the place Navona, he tried to
inflame the casual dispute of some boys and mechanics into a general
rising of the people. Yet the humane Nicholas was still averse to accept
the forfeit of his life; and the traitor was removed from the scene of
temptation to Bologna, with a liberal allowance for his support, and the
easy obligation of presenting himself each day before the governor of
the city. But Porcaro had learned from the younger Brutus, that with
tyrants no faith or gratitude should be observed: the exile declaimed
against the arbitrary sentence; a party and a conspiracy were gradually
formed: his nephew, a daring youth, assembled a band of volunteers; and
on the appointed evening a feast was prepared at his house for the
friends of the republic. Their leader, who had escaped from Bologna,
appeared among them in a robe of purple and gold: his voice, his
countenance, his gestures, bespoke the man who had devoted his life or
death to the glorious cause. In a studied oration, he expiated on the
motives and the means of their enterprise; the name and liberties of
Rome; the sloth and pride of their ecclesiastical tyrants; the active or
passive consent of their fellow-citizens; three hundred soldiers, and
four hundred exiles, long exercised in arms or in wrongs; the license of
revenge to edge their swords, and a million of ducats to reward their
victory. It would be easy, (he said,) on the next day, the festival of
the Epiphany, to seize the pope and his cardinals, before the doors, or
at the altar, of St. Peter's; to lead them in chains under the walls of
St. Angelo; to extort by the threat of their instant death a surrender
of the castle; to ascend the vacant Capitol; to ring the alarm bell; and
to restore in a popular assembly the ancient republic of Rome. While he
triumphed, he was already betrayed. The senator, with a strong guard,
invested the house: the nephew of Porcaro cut his way through the crowd;
but the unfortunate Stephen was drawn from a chest, lamenting that his
enemies had anticipated by three hours the execution of his design.
After such manifest and repeated guilt, even the mercy of Nicholas was
silent. Porcaro, and nine of his accomplices, were hanged without the
benefit of the sacraments; and, amidst the fears and invectives of the
papal court, the Romans pitied, and almost applauded, these martyrs of
their country. ^85 But their applause was mute, their pity ineffectual,
their liberty forever extinct; and, if they have since risen in a
vacancy of the throne or a scarcity of bread, such accidental tumults
may be found in the bosom of the most abject servitude.

[Footnote 85: Besides the curious, though concise, narrative of
Machiavel, (Istoria Florentina, l. vi. Opere, tom. i. p. 210, 211, edit.
Londra, 1747, in 4to.) the Porcarian conspiracy is related in the Diary
of Stephen Infessura, (Rer. Ital. tom. iii. P. ii. p. 1134, 1135,) and
in a separate tract by Leo Baptista Alberti, (Rer. Ital. tom. xxv. p.
609--614.) It is amusing to compare the style and sentiments of the
courtier and citizen. Facinus profecto quo . . . . neque periculo
horribilius, neque audaciâdetestabilius, neque crudelitate tetrius, a
quoquam perditissimo uspiam excogitatum sit . . . . Perdette la vita
quell' huomo da bene, e amatore dello bene e libertàdi Roma.]

But the independence of the nobles, which was fomented by discord,
survived the freedom of the commons, which must be founded in union. A
privilege of rapine and oppression was long maintained by the barons of
Rome; their houses were a fortress and a sanctuary: and the ferocious
train of banditti and criminals whom they protected from the law repaid
the hospitality with the service of their swords and daggers. The
private interest of the pontiffs, or their nephews, sometimes involved
them in these domestic feuds. Under the reign of Sixtus the Fourth, Rome
was distracted by the battles and sieges of the rival houses: after the
conflagration of his palace, the prothonotary Colonna was tortured and
beheaded; and Savelli, his captive friend, was murdered on the spot, for
refusing to join in the acclamations of the victorious Ursini. ^86 But
the popes no longer trembled in the Vatican: they had strength to
command, if they had resolution to claim, the obedience of their
subjects; and the strangers, who observed these partial disorders,
admired the easy taxes and wise administration of the ecclesiastical
state. ^87

[Footnote 86: The disorders of Rome, which were much inflamed by the
partiality of Sixtus IV. are exposed in the Diaries of two spectators,
Stephen Infessura, and an anonymous citizen. See the troubles of the
year 1484, and the death of the prothonotary Colonna, in tom. iii. P.
ii. p. 1083, 1158.]

[Footnote 87: Est toute la terre de l'église troublée pour cette
partialité(des Colonnes et des Ursins) come nous dirions Luce et
Grammont, ou en Hollande Houc et Caballan; et quand ce ne seroit ce
différend la terre de l'église seroit la plus heureuse habitation pour
les sujets qui soit dans toute le monde (car ils ne payent ni tailles ni
guères autres choses,) et seroient toujours bien conduits, (car toujours
les papes sont sages et bien consellies;) mais très souvent en advient
de grands et cruels meurtres et pilleries.]

The spiritual thunders of the Vatican depend on the force of opinion;
and if that opinion be supplanted by reason or passion, the sound may
idly waste itself in the air; and the helpless priest is exposed to the
brutal violence of a noble or a plebeian adversary. But after their
return from Avignon, the keys of St. Peter were guarded by the sword of
St. Paul. Rome was commanded by an impregnable citadel: the use of
cannon is a powerful engine against popular seditions: a regular force
of cavalry and infantry was enlisted under the banners of the pope: his
ample revenues supplied the resources of war: and, from the extent of
his domain, he could bring down on a rebellious city an army of hostile
neighbors and loyal subjects. ^88 Since the union of the duchies of
Ferrara and Urbino, the ecclesiastical state extends from the
Mediterranean to the Adriatic, and from the confines of Naples to the
banks of the Po; and as early as the sixteenth century, the greater part
of that spacious and fruitful country acknowledged the lawful claims and
temporal sovereignty of the Roman pontiffs. Their claims were readily
deduced from the genuine, or fabulous, donations of the darker ages: the
successive steps of their final settlement would engage us too far in
the transactions of Italy, and even of Europe; the crimes of Alexander
the Sixth, the martial operations of Julius the Second, and the liberal
policy of Leo the Tenth, a theme which has been adorned by the pens of
the noblest historians of the times. ^89 In the first period of their
conquests, till the expedition of Charles the Eighth, the popes might
successfully wrestle with the adjacent princes and states, whose
military force was equal, or inferior, to their own. But as soon as the
monarchs of France, Germany and Spain, contended with gigantic arms for
the dominion of Italy, they supplied with art the deficiency of
strength; and concealed, in a labyrinth of wars and treaties, their
aspiring views, and the immortal hope of chasing the Barbarians beyond
the Alps. The nice balance of the Vatican was often subverted by the
soldiers of the North and West, who were united under the standard of
Charles the Fifth: the feeble and fluctuating policy of Clement the
Seventh exposed his person and dominions to the conqueror; and Rome was
abandoned seven months to a lawless army, more cruel and rapacious than
the Goths and Vandals. ^90 After this severe lesson, the popes
contracted their ambition, which was almost satisfied, resumed the
character of a common parent, and abstained from all offensive
hostilities, except in a hasty quarrel, when the vicar of Christ and the
Turkish sultan were armed at the same time against the kingdom of
Naples. ^91 The French and Germans at length withdrew from the field of
battle: Milan, Naples, Sicily, Sardinia, and the sea-coast of Tuscany,
were firmly possessed by the Spaniards; and it became their interest to
maintain the peace and dependence of Italy, which continued almost
without disturbance from the middle of the sixteenth to the opening of
the eighteenth century. The Vatican was swayed and protected by the
religious policy of the Catholic king: his prejudice and interest
disposed him in every dispute to support the prince against the people;
and instead of the encouragement, the aid, and the asylum, which they
obtained from the adjacent states, the friends of liberty, or the
enemies of law, were enclosed on all sides within the iron circle of
despotism. The long habits of obedience and education subdued the
turbulent spirit of the nobles and commons of Rome. The barons forgot
the arms and factions of their ancestors, and insensibly became the
servants of luxury and government. Instead of maintaining a crowd of
tenants and followers, the produce of their estates was consumed in the
private expenses which multiply the pleasures, and diminish the power,
of the lord. ^92 The Colonna and Ursini vied with each other in the
decoration of their palaces and chapels; and their antique splendor was
rivalled or surpassed by the sudden opulence of the papal families. In
Rome the voice of freedom and discord is no longer heard; and, instead
of the foaming torrent, a smooth and stagnant lake reflects the image of
idleness and servitude.

[Footnote 88: By the conomy of Sixtus V. the revenue of the
ecclesiastical state was raised to two millions and a half of Roman
crowns, (Vita, tom. ii. p. 291--296;) and so regular was the military
establishment, that in one month Clement VIII. could invade the duchy of
Ferrara with three thousand horse and twenty thousand foot, (tom. iii.
p. 64) Since that time (A.D. 1597) the papal arms are happily rusted:
but the revenue must have gained some nominal increase. *

Note: * On the financial measures of Sixtus V. see Ranke, Dio Römischen
Päpste, i. p. 459. -- M.]

[Footnote 89: More especially by Guicciardini and Machiavel; in the
general history of the former, in the Florentine history, the Prince,
and the political discourses of the latter. These, with their worthy
successors, Fra Paolo and Davila, were justly esteemed the first
historians of modern languages, till, in the present age, Scotland
arose, to dispute the prize with Italy herself.]

[Footnote 90: In the history of the Gothic siege, I have compared the
Barbarians with the subjects of Charles V., (vol. iii. p. 289, 290;) an
anticipation, which, like that of the Tartar conquests, I indulged with
the less scruple, as I could scarcely hope to reach the conclusion of my
work.]

[Footnote 91: The ambitious and feeble hostilities of the Caraffa pope,
Paul IV. may be seen in Thuanus (l. xvi.--xviii.) and Giannone, (tom. iv
p. 149--163.) Those Catholic bigots, Philip II. and the duke of Alva,
presumed to separate the Roman prince from the vicar of Christ, yet the
holy character, which would have sanctified his victory was decently
applied to protect his defeat. *

Note: * But compare Ranke, Die Römischen Päpste, i. p. 289. -- M.]

[Footnote 92: This gradual change of manners and expense is admirably
explained by Dr. Adam Smith, (Wealth of Nations, vol. i. p. 495--504,)
who proves, perhaps too severely, that the most salutary effects have
flowed from the meanest and most selfish causes.]

A Christian, a philosopher, ^93 and a patriot, will be equally
scandalized by the temporal kingdom of the clergy; and the local majesty
of Rome, the remembrance of her consuls and triumphs, may seem to
imbitter the sense, and aggravate the shame, of her slavery. If we
calmly weigh the merits and defects of the ecclesiastical government, it
may be praised in its present state, as a mild, decent, and tranquil
system, exempt from the dangers of a minority, the sallies of youth, the
expenses of luxury, and the calamities of war. But these advantages are
overbalanced by a frequent, perhaps a septennial, election of a
sovereign, who is seldom a native of the country; the reign of a
youngstatesman of threescore, in the decline of his life and abilities,
without hope to accomplish, and without children to inherit, the labors
of his transitory reign. The successful candidate is drawn from the
church, and even the convent; from the mode of education and life the
most adverse to reason, humanity, and freedom. In the trammels of
servile faith, he has learned to believe because it is absurd, to revere
all that is contemptible, and to despise whatever might deserve the
esteem of a rational being; to punish error as a crime, to reward
mortification and celibacy as the first of virtues; to place the saints
of the calendar ^94 above the heroes of Rome and the sages of Athens;
and to consider the missal, or the crucifix, as more useful instruments
than the plough or the loom. In the office of nuncio, or the rank of
cardinal, he may acquire some knowledge of the world, but the primitive
stain will adhere to his mind and manners: from study and experience he
may suspect the mystery of his profession; but the sacerdotal artist
will imbibe some portion of the bigotry which he inculcates. The genius
of Sixtus the Fifth ^95 burst from the gloom of a Franciscan cloister.
In a reign of five years, he exterminated the outlaws and banditti,
abolished the profanesanctuaries of Rome, ^96 formed a naval and
military force, restored and emulated the monuments of antiquity, and
after a liberal use and large increase of the revenue, left five
millions of crowns in the castle of St. Angelo. But his justice was
sullied with cruelty, his activity was prompted by the ambition of
conquest: after his decease the abuses revived; the treasure was
dissipated; he entailed on posterity thirty-five new taxes and the
venality of offices; and, after his death, his statue was demolished by
an ungrateful, or an injured, people. ^97 The wild and original
character of Sixtus the Fifth stands alone in the series of the
pontiffs; the maxims and effects of their temporal government may be
collected from the positive and comparative view of the arts and
philosophy, the agriculture and trade, the wealth and population, of the
ecclesiastical state. For myself, it is my wish to depart in charity
with all mankind, nor am I willing, in these last moments, to offend
even the pope and clergy of Rome. ^98

[Footnote 93: Mr. Hume (Hist. of England, vol. i. p. 389) too hastily
conclude that if the civil and ecclesiastical powers be united in the
same person, it is of little moment whether he be styled prince or
prelate since the temporal character will always predominate.]

[Footnote 94: A Protestant may disdain the unworthy preference of St.
Francis or St. Dominic, but he will not rashly condemn the zeal or
judgment of Sixtus V., who placed the statues of the apostles St. Peter
and St. Paul on the vacant columns of Trajan and Antonine.]

[Footnote 95: A wandering Italian, Gregorio Leti, has given the Vita di
Sisto-Quinto, (Amstel. 1721, 3 vols. in 12mo.,) a copious and amusing
work, but which does not command our absolute confidence. Yet the
character of the man, and the principal facts, are supported by the
annals of Spondanus and Muratori, (A.D. 1585--1590,) and the
contemporary history of the great Thuanus, (l. lxxxii. c. 1, 2, l.
lxxxiv. c. 10, l. c. c. 8.) *

Note: * The industry of M. Ranke has discovered the document, a kind of
scandalous chronicle of the time, from which Leti wrought up his amusing
romances. See also M. Ranke's observations on the Life of Sixtus. by
Tempesti, b. iii. p. 317, 324. -- M.]

[Footnote 96: These privileged places, the quartierior franchises, were
adopted from the Roman nobles by the foreign ministers. Julius II. had
once abolished the abominandum et detestandum franchitiarum hujusmodi
nomen: and after Sixtus V. they again revived. I cannot discern either
the justice or magnanimity of Louis XIV., who, in 1687, sent his
ambassador, the marquis de Lavardin, to Rome, with an armed force of a
thousand officers, guards, and domestics, to maintain this iniquitous
claim, and insult Pope Innocent XI. in the heart of his capital, (Vita
di Sisto V. tom. iii. p. 260--278. Muratori, Annali d'Italia, tom. xv.
p. 494--496, and Voltaire, Siecle de Louis XIV. tom. i. c. 14, p. 58,
59.)]

[Footnote 97: This outrage produced a decree, which was inscribed on
marble, and placed in the Capitol. It is expressed in a style of manly
simplicity and freedom: Si quis, sive privatus, sive magistratum gerens
de collocandâvivopontifici statuâmentionem facere ausit, legitimo S. P.
Q. R. decreto in perpetuum infamis et publicorum munerum expers esto.
MDXC. mense Augusto, (Vita di Sisto V. tom. iii. p. 469.) I believe that
this decree is still observed, and I know that every monarch who
deserves a statue should himself impose the prohibition.]

[Footnote 98: The histories of the church, Italy, and Christendom, have
contributed to the chapter which I now conclude. In the original Lives
of the Popes, we often discover the city and republic of Rome: and the
events of the xivth and xvth centuries are preserved in the rude and
domestic chronicles which I have carefully inspected, and shall
recapitulate in the order of time.

1. Monaldeschi (Ludovici Boncomitis) Fragmenta Annalium Roman. A.D.
1328, in the Scriptores Rerum Italicarum of Muratori, tom. xii. p. 525.
N. B. The credit of this fragment is somewhat hurt by a singular
interpolation, in which the author relates his own death at the age of
115 years.

2. Fragmenta HistoriæRomanæ(vulgo Thomas Fortifioccæ) in Romana Dialecto
vulgari, (A.D. 1327--1354, in Muratori, Antiquitat. Medii Ævi Italiæ,
tom. iii. p. 247--548;) the authentic groundwork of the history of
Rienzi.

3. Delphini (Gentilis) Diarium Romanum, (A.D. 1370--1410,) in the Rerum
Italicarum, tom. iii. P. ii. p. 846.

4. Antonii (Petri) Diarium Rom., (A.D. 1404--1417,) tom. xxiv. p. 699.

5. Petroni (Pauli) Miscellanea Historica Romana, (A.D. 1433--1446,) tom.
xxiv. p. 1101.

6. Volaterrani (Jacob.) Diarium Rom., (A.D. 1472--1484,) tom. xxiii p.
81.

7. Anonymi Diarium Urbis Romæ, (A.D. 1481--1492,) tom. iii. P. ii. p.
1069.

8. Infessuræ(Stephani) Diarium Romanum, (A.D. 1294, or 1378--1494,) tom.
iii. P. ii. p. 1109.

9. Historia Arcana Alexandri VI. sive Excerpta ex Diario Joh. Burcardi,
(A.D. 1492--1503,) edita a Godefr. Gulielm. Leibnizio, Hanover, 697, in
14to. The large and valuable Journal of Burcard might be completed from
the MSS. in different libraries of Italy and France, (M. de Foncemagne,
in the Mémoires de l'Acad. des Inscrip. tom. xvii. p. 597--606.)

Except the last, all these fragments and diaries are inserted in the
Collections of Muratori, my guide and master in the history of Italy.
His country, and the public, are indebted to him for the following works
on that subject: 1. Rerum Italicarum Scriptores, (A.D. 500--1500,)
quorum potissima pars nunc primum in lucem prodit, &c., xxviii. vols. in
folio, Milan, 1723--1738, 1751. A volume of chronological and
alphabetical tables is still wanting as a key to this great work, which
is yet in a disorderly and defective state. 2. Antiquitates ItaliæMedii
Ævi, vi. vols. in folio, Milan, 1738--1743, in lxxv. curious
dissertations, on the manners, government, religion, &c., of the
Italians of the darker ages, with a large supplement of charters,
chronicles, &c. 3. Dissertazioni sopra le Antiquita Italiane, iii. vols.
in 4to., Milano, 1751, a free version by the author, which may be quoted
with the same confidence as the Latin text of the Antiquities. Annali d'
Italia, xviii. vols. in octavo, Milan, 1753--1756, a dry, though
accurate and useful, abridgment of the history of Italy, from the birth
of Christ to the middle of the xviiith century. 5. Dell' Antichita
Estense ed Italiane, ii. vols. in folio, Modena, 1717, 1740. In the
history of this illustrious race, the parent of our Brunswick kings, the
critic is not seduced by the loyalty or gratitude of the subject. In all
his works, Muratori approves himself a diligent and laborious writer,
who aspires above the prejudices of a Catholic priest. He was born in
the year 1672, and died in the year 1750, after passing near 60 years in
the libraries of Milan and Modena, (Vita del Proposto Ludovico Antonio
Muratori, by his nephew and successor Gian. Francesco Soli Muratori
Venezia, 1756 m 4to.)]

Chapter LXXI: Prospect Of The Ruins Of Rome In The Fifteenth
Century.Part I.



Prospect Of The Ruins Of Rome In The Fifteenth Century. -- Four Causes
Of Decay And Destruction. -- Example Of The Coliseum. -- Renovation Of
The City. -- Conclusion Of The Whole Work.

In the last days of Pope Eugenius the Fourth, ^* two of his servants,
the learned Poggius ^1 and a friend, ascended the Capitoline hill;
reposed themselves among the ruins of columns and temples; and viewed
from that commanding spot the wide and various prospect of desolation.
^2 The place and the object gave ample scope for moralizing on the
vicissitudes of fortune, which spares neither man nor the proudest of
his works, which buries empires and cities in a common grave; and it was
agreed, that in proportion to her former greatness, the fall of Rome was
the more awful and deplorable. "Her primeval state, such as she might
appear in a remote age, when Evander entertained the stranger of Troy,
^3 has been delineated by the fancy of Virgil. This Tarpeian rock was
then a savage and solitary thicket: in the time of the poet, it was
crowned with the golden roofs of a temple; the temple is overthrown, the
gold has been pillaged, the wheel of fortune has accomplished her
revolution, and the sacred ground is again disfigured with thorns and
brambles. The hill of the Capitol, on which we sit, was formerly the
head of the Roman empire, the citadel of the earth, the terror of kings;
illustrated by the footsteps of so many triumphs, enriched with the
spoils and tributes of so many nations. This spectacle of the world, how
is it fallen! how changed! how defaced! The path of victory is
obliterated by vines, and the benches of the senators are concealed by a
dunghill. Cast your eyes on the Palatine hill, and seek among the
shapeless and enormous fragments the marble theatre, the obelisks, the
colossal statues, the porticos of Nero's palace: survey the other hills
of the city, the vacant space is interrupted only by ruins and gardens.
The forum of the Roman people, where they assembled to enact their laws
and elect their magistrates, is now enclosed for the cultivation of
pot-herbs, or thrown open for the reception of swine and buffaloes. The
public and private edifices, that were founded for eternity, lie
prostrate, naked, and broken, like the limbs of a mighty giant; and the
ruin is the more visible, from the stupendous relics that have survived
the injuries of time and fortune." ^4

[Footnote *: It should be Pope Martin the Fifth. See Gibbon's own note,
ch. lxv, note 51 and Hobhouse, Illustrations of Childe Harold, p. 155.
-- M.]

[Footnote 1: I have already (notes 50, 51, on chap. lxv.) mentioned the
age, character, and writings of Poggius; and particularly noticed the
date of this elegant moral lecture on the varieties of fortune.]

[Footnote 2: Consedimus in ipsis Tarpeiæarcis ruinis, pone ingens
portæcujusdam, ut puto, templi, marmoreum limen, plurimasque passim
confractas columnas, unde magnâex parte prospectus urbis patet, (p. 5.)]

[Footnote 3: Æneid viii. 97--369. This ancient picture, so artfully
introduced, and so exquisitely finished, must have been highly
interesting to an inhabitant of Rome; and our early studies allow us to
sympathize in the feelings of a Roman.]

[Footnote 4: Capitolium adeo . . . . immutatum ut vineæin senatorum
subsellia successerint, stercorum ac purgamentorum receptaculum factum.
Respice ad Palatinum montem . . . . . vasta rudera . . . . cæteros
colles perlustra omnia vacua ædificiis, ruinis vineisque oppleta
conspicies, (Poggius, de Varietat. Fortunæp. 21.)]

These relics are minutely described by Poggius, one of the first who
raised his eyes from the monuments of legendary, to those of classic,
superstition. ^5 1.Besides a bridge, an arch, a sepulchre, and the
pyramid of Cestius, he could discern, of the age of the republic, a
double row of vaults, in the salt-office of the Capitol, which were
inscribed with the name and munificence of Catulus. 2.Eleven temples
were visible in some degree, from the perfect form of the Pantheon, to
the three arches and a marble column of the temple of Peace, which
Vespasian erected after the civil wars and the Jewish triumph. 3.Of the
number, which he rashly defines, of seven therm, or public baths, none
were sufficiently entire to represent the use and distribution of the
several parts: but those of Diocletian and Antoninus Caracalla still
retained the titles of the founders, and astonished the curious
spectator, who, in observing their solidity and extent, the variety of
marbles, the size and multitude of the columns, compared the labor and
expense with the use and importance. Of the baths of Constantine, of
Alexander, of Domitian, or rather of Titus, some vestige might yet be
found.4.The triumphal arches of Titus, Severus, and Constantine, were
entire, both the structure and the inscriptions; a falling fragment was
honored with the name of Trajan; and two arches, then extant, in the
Flaminian way, have been ascribed to the baser memory of Faustina and
Gallienus. ^* 5.After the wonder of the Coliseum, Poggius might have
overlooked small amphitheatre of brick, most probably for the use of the
prætorian camp: the theatres of Marcellus and Pompey were occupied in a
great measure by public and private buildings; and in the Circus,
Agonalis and Maximus, little more than the situation and the form could
be investigated. 6.The columns of Trajan and Antonine were still erect;
but the Egyptian obelisks were broken or buried. A people of gods and
heroes, the workmanship of art, was reduced to one equestrian figure of
gilt brass, and to five marble statues, of which the most conspicuous
were the two horses of Phidias and Praxiteles.7.The two mausoleums or
sepulchres of Augustus and Hadrian could not totally be lost: but the
former was only visible as a mound of earth; and the latter, the castle
of St. Angelo, had acquired the name and appearance of a modern
fortress. With the addition of some separate and nameless columns, such
were the remains of the ancient city; for the marks of a more recent
structure might be detected in the walls, which formed a circumference
of ten miles, included three hundred and seventy-nine turrets, and
opened into the country by thirteen gates.

[Footnote 5: See Poggius, p. 8--22.]

[Footnote *: One was in the Via Nomentana; est alter præterea Gallieno
principi dicatus, ut superscriptio indicat, ViâNomentana. Hobhouse, p.
154. Poggio likewise mentions the building which Gibbon ambiguously says
be "might have overlooked." -- M.]

This melancholy picture was drawn above nine hundred years after the
fall of the Western empire, and even of the Gothic kingdom of Italy. A
long period of distress and anarchy, in which empire, and arts, and
riches had migrated from the banks of the Tyber, was incapable of
restoring or adorning the city; and, as all that is human must
retrograde if it do not advance, every successive age must have hastened
the ruin of the works of antiquity. To measure the progress of decay,
and to ascertain, at each æra, the state of each edifice, would be an
endless and a useless labor; and I shall content myself with two
observations, which will introduce a short inquiry into the general
causes and effects. 1.Two hundred years before the eloquent complaint of
Poggius, an anonymous writer composed a description of Rome. ^6 His
ignorance may repeat the same objects under strange and fabulous names.
Yet this barbarous topographer had eyes and ears; he could observe the
visible remains; he could listen to the tradition of the people; and he
distinctly enumerates seven theatres, eleven baths, twelve arches, and
eighteen palaces, of which many had disappeared before the time of
Poggius. It is apparent, that many stately monuments of antiquity
survived till a late period, ^7 and that the principles of destruction
acted with vigorous and increasing energy in the thirteenth and
fourteenth centuries. 2.The same reflection must be applied to the three
last ages; and we should vainly seek the Septizonium of Severus; ^8
which is celebrated by Petrarch and the antiquarians of the sixteenth
century. While the Roman edifices were still entire, the first blows,
however weighty and impetuous, were resisted by the solidity of the mass
and the harmony of the parts; but the slightest touch would precipitate
the fragments of arches and columns, that already nodded to their fall.

[Footnote 6: Liber de Mirabilibus Romæex Registro Nicolai Cardinalis de
Arragoniâin BibliothecâSt. Isidori Armario IV., No. 69. This treatise,
with some short but pertinent notes, has been published by Montfaucon,
(Diarium Italicum, p. 283--301,) who thus delivers his own critical
opinion: Scriptor xiiimi. circiter sæculi, ut ibidem notatur;
antiquariærei imperitus et, ut ab illo ævo, nugis et anilibus fabellis
refertus: sed, quia monumenta, quæiis temporibus Romæsupererant pro
modulo recenset, non parum inde lucis mutuabitur qui Romanis
antiquitatibus indagandis operam navabit, (p. 283.)]

[Footnote 7: The Père Mabillon (Analecta, tom. iv. p. 502) has published
an anonymous pilgrim of the ixth century, who, in his visit round the
churches and holy places at Rome, touches on several buildings,
especially porticos, which had disappeared before the xiiith century.]

[Footnote 8: On the Septizonium, see the Mémoires sur Pétrarque, (tom.
i. p. 325,) Donatus, (p. 338,) and Nardini, (p. 117, 414.)]

After a diligent inquiry, I can discern four principal causes of the
ruin of Rome, which continued to operate in a period of more than a
thousand years. I. The injuries of time and nature. II. The hostile
attacks of the Barbarians and Christians. III. The use and abuse of the
materials. And, IV. The domestic quarrels of the Romans.

I. The art of man is able to construct monuments far more permanent than
the narrow span of his own existence; yet these monuments, like himself,
are perishable and frail; and in the boundless annals of time, his life
and his labors must equally be measured as a fleeting moment. Of a
simple and solid edifice, it is not easy, however, to circumscribe the
duration. As the wonders of ancient days, the pyramids ^9 attracted the
curiosity of the ancients: a hundred generations, the leaves of autumn,
have dropped ^10 into the grave; and after the fall of the Pharaohs and
Ptolemies, the Cæsars and caliphs, the same pyramids stand erect and
unshaken above the floods of the Nile. A complex figure of various and
minute parts to more accessible to injury and decay; and the silent
lapse of time is often accelerated by hurricanes and earthquakes, by
fires and inundations. The air and earth have doubtless been shaken; and
the lofty turrets of Rome have tottered from their foundations; but the
seven hills do not appear to be placed on the great cavities of the
globe; nor has the city, in any age, been exposed to the convulsions of
nature, which, in the climate of Antioch, Lisbon, or Lima, have crumbled
in a few moments the works of ages into dust. Fire is the most powerful
agent of life and death: the rapid mischief may be kindled and
propagated by the industry or negligence of mankind; and every period of
the Roman annals is marked by the repetition of similar calamities. A
memorable conflagration, the guilt or misfortune of Nero's reign,
continued, though with unequal fury, either six or nine days. ^11
Innumerable buildings, crowded in close and crooked streets, supplied
perpetual fuel for the flames; and when they ceased, four only of the
fourteen regions were left entire; three were totally destroyed, and
seven were deformed by the relics of smoking and lacerated edifices. ^12
In the full meridian of empire, the metropolis arose with fresh beauty
from her ashes; yet the memory of the old deplored their irreparable
losses, the arts of Greece, the trophies of victory, the monuments of
primitive or fabulous antiquity. In the days of distress and anarchy,
every wound is mortal, every fall irretrievable; nor can the damage be
restored either by the public care of government, or the activity of
private interest. Yet two causes may be alleged, which render the
calamity of fire more destructive to a flourishing than a decayed city.
1.The more combustible materials of brick, timber, and metals, are first
melted or consumed; but the flames may play without injury or effect on
the naked walls, and massy arches, that have been despoiled of their
ornaments. 2.It is among the common and plebeian habitations, that a
mischievous spark is most easily blown to a conflagration; but as soon
as they are devoured, the greater edifices, which have resisted or
escaped, are left as so many islands in a state of solitude and safety.
From her situation, Rome is exposed to the danger of frequent
inundations. Without excepting the Tyber, the rivers that descend from
either side of the Apennine have a short and irregular course; a shallow
stream in the summer heats; an impetuous torrent, when it is swelled in
the spring or winter, by the fall of rain, and the melting of the snows.
When the current is repelled from the sea by adverse winds, when the
ordinary bed is inadequate to the weight of waters, they rise above the
banks, and overspread, without limits or control, the plains and cities
of the adjacent country. Soon after the triumph of the first Punic war,
the Tyber was increased by unusual rains; and the inundation, surpassing
all former measure of time and place, destroyed all the buildings that
were situated below the hills of Rome. According to the variety of
ground, the same mischief was produced by different means; and the
edifices were either swept away by the sudden impulse, or dissolved and
undermined by the long continuance, of the flood. ^13 Under the reign of
Augustus, the same calamity was renewed: the lawless river overturned
the palaces and temples on its banks; ^14 and, after the labors of the
emperor in cleansing and widening the bed that was encumbered with
ruins, ^15 the vigilance of his successors was exercised by similar
dangers and designs. The project of diverting into new channels the
Tyber itself, or some of the dependent streams, was long opposed by
superstition and local interests; ^16 nor did the use compensate the
toil and cost of the tardy and imperfect execution. The servitude of
rivers is the noblest and most important victory which man has obtained
over the licentiousness of nature; ^17 and if such were the ravages of
the Tyber under a firm and active government, what could oppose, or who
can enumerate, the injuries of the city, after the fall of the Western
empire? A remedy was at length produced by the evil itself: the
accumulation of rubbish and the earth, that has been washed down from
the hills, is supposed to have elevated the plain of Rome, fourteen or
fifteen feet, perhaps, above the ancient level; ^18 and the modern city
is less accessible to the attacks of the river. ^19

[Footnote 9: The age of the pyramids is remote and unknown, since
Diodorus Siculus (tom. i l. i. c. 44, p. 72) is unable to decide whether
they were constructed 1000, or 3400, years before the clxxxth Olympiad.
Sir John Marsham's contracted scale of the Egyptian dynasties would fix
them about 2000 years before Christ, (Canon. Chronicus, p. 47.)]

[Footnote 10: See the speech of Glaucus in the Iliad, (Z. 146.) This
natural but melancholy image is peculiar to Homer.]

[Footnote 11: The learning and criticism of M. des Vignoles (Histoire
Critique de la République des Lettres, tom. viii. p. 47--118, ix. p.
172--187) dates the fire of Rome from A.D. 64, July 19, and the
subsequent persecution of the Christians from November 15 of the same
year.]

[Footnote 12: Quippe in regiones quatuordecim Roma dividitur, quarum
quatuor integræmanebant, tres solo tenus dejectæ: septem reliquis pauca
testorum vestigia supererant, lacera et semiusta. Among the old relics
that were irreparably lost, Tacitus enumerates the temple of the moon of
Servius Tullius; the fane and altar consecrated by Evander præsenti
Herculi; the temple of Jupiter Stator, a vow of Romulus; the palace of
Numa; the temple of Vesta cum Penatibus populi Romani. He then deplores
the opes tot victoriis quæsitæet Græcarum artium decora . . . . multa
quæseniores meminerant, quæreparari nequibant, (Annal. xv. 40, 41.)]

[Footnote 13: A. U. C. 507, repentina subversio ipsius Romæprævenit
triumphum Romanorum . . . . diversæignium aquarumque clades pene
absumsere urbem Nam Tiberis insolitis auctus imbribus et ultra
opinionem, vel diuturnitate vel maguitudine redundans, omniaRomæædificia
in plano posita delevit. Diversæqualitates locorum ad unam convenere
perniciem: quoniam et quæsegnior inundatio tenuit madefacta dissolvit,
et quæcursus torrentis invenit impulsa dejecit, (Orosius, Hist. l. iv.
c. 11, p. 244, edit. Havercamp.) Yet we may observe, that it is the plan
and study of the Christian apologist to magnify the calamities of the
Pagan world.]

[Footnote 14:

Vidimus flavum Tiberim, retortis

Littore Etrusco violenter undis,

Ire dejectum monumenta Regis

Templaque Vestæ. (Horat. Carm. I. 2.)

If the palace of Numa and temple of Vesta were thrown down in Horace's
time, what was consumed of those buildings by Nero's fire could hardly
deserve the epithets of vetustissima or incorrupta.]

[Footnote 15: Ad coercendas inundationes alveum Tiberis laxavit, ac
repurgavit, completum olim ruderibus, et ædificiorum prolapsionibus
coarctatum, (Suetonius in Augusto, c. 30.)]

[Footnote 16: Tacitus (Annal. i. 79) reports the petitions of the
different towns of Italy to the senate against the measure; and we may
applaud the progress of reason. On a similar occasion, local interests
would undoubtedly be consulted: but an English House of Commons would
reject with contempt the arguments of superstition, "that nature had
assigned to the rivers their proper course," &c.]

[Footnote 17: See the Epoques de la Nature of the eloquent and
philosophic Buffon. His picture of Guyana, in South America, is that of
a new and savage land, in which the waters are abandoned to themselves
without being regulated by human industry, (p. 212, 561, quarto
edition.)]

[Footnote 18: In his travels in Italy, Mr. Addison (his works, vol. ii.
p. 98, Baskerville's edition) has observed this curious and
unquestionable fact.]

[Footnote 19: Yet in modern times, the Tyber has sometimes damaged the
city, and in the years 1530, 1557, 1598, the annals of Muratori record
three mischievous and memorable inundations, (tom. xiv. p. 268, 429,
tom. xv. p. 99, &c.) *

Note: * The level of the Tyber was at one time supposed to be
considerably raised: recent investigations seem to be conclusive against
this supposition. See a brief, but satisfactory statement of the
question in Bunsen and Platner, Roms Beschreibung. vol. i. p. 29. -- M.]

II. The crowd of writers of every nation, who impute the destruction of
the Roman monuments to the Goths and the Christians, have neglected to
inquire how far they were animated by a hostile principle, and how far
they possessed the means and the leisure to satiate their enmity. In the
preceding volumes of this History, I have described the triumph of
barbarism and religion; and I can only resume, in a few words, their
real or imaginary connection with the ruin of ancient Rome. Our fancy
may create, or adopt, a pleasing romance, that the Goths and Vandals
sallied from Scandinavia, ardent to avenge the flight of Odin; ^20 to
break the chains, and to chastise the oppressors, of mankind; that they
wished to burn the records of classic literature, and to found their
national architecture on the broken members of the Tuscan and Corinthian
orders. But in simple truth, the northern conquerors were neither
sufficiently savage, nor sufficiently refined, to entertain such
aspiring ideas of destruction and revenge. The shepherds of Scythia and
Germany had been educated in the armies of the empire, whose discipline
they acquired, and whose weakness they invaded: with the familiar use of
the Latin tongue, they had learned to reverence the name and titles of
Rome; and, though incapable of emulating, they were more inclined to
admire, than to abolish, the arts and studies of a brighter period. In
the transient possession of a rich and unresisting capital, the soldiers
of Alaric and Genseric were stimulated by the passions of a victorious
army; amidst the wanton indulgence of lust or cruelty, portable wealth
was the object of their search; nor could they derive either pride or
pleasure from the unprofitable reflection, that they had battered to the
ground the works of the consuls and Cæsars. Their moments were indeed
precious; the Goths evacuated Rome on the sixth, ^21 the Vandals on the
fifteenth, day: ^22 and, though it be far more difficult to build than
to destroy, their hasty assault would have made a slight impression on
the solid piles of antiquity. We may remember, that both Alaric and
Genseric affected to spare the buildings of the city; that they
subsisted in strength and beauty under the auspicious government of
Theodoric; ^23 and that the momentary resentment of Totila ^24 was
disarmed by his own temper and the advice of his friends and enemies.
From these innocent Barbarians, the reproach may be transferred to the
Catholics of Rome. The statues, altars, and houses, of the dæmons, were
an abomination in their eyes; and in the absolute command of the city,
they might labor with zeal and perseverance to erase the idolatry of
their ancestors. The demolition of the temples in the East ^25 affords
to theman example of conduct, and to usan argument of belief; and it is
probable that a portion of guilt or merit may be imputed with justice to
the Roman proselytes. Yet their abhorrence was confined to the monuments
of heathen superstition; and the civil structures that were dedicated to
the business or pleasure of society might be preserved without injury or
scandal. The change of religion was accomplished, not by a popular
tumult, but by the decrees of the emperors, of the senate, and of time.
Of the Christian hierarchy, the bishops of Rome were commonly the most
prudent and least fanatic; nor can any positive charge be opposed to the
meritorious act of saving or converting the majestic structure of the
Pantheon. ^26 ^*

[Footnote 20: I take this opportunity of declaring, that in the course
of twelve years, I have forgotten, or renounced, the flight of Odin from
Azoph to Sweden, which I never very seriously believed, (vol. i. p.
283.) The Goths are apparently Germans: but all beyond Cæsar and Tacitus
is darkness or fable, in the antiquities of Germany.]

[Footnote 21: History of the Decline, &c., vol. iii. p. 291.]

[Footnote 22: ---------------------- vol. iii. p. 464.]

[Footnote 23: ---------------------- vol. iv. p. 23--25.]

[Footnote 24: ---------------------- vol. iv. p. 258.]

[Footnote 25: ---------------------- vol. iii. c. xxviii. p. 139--148.]

[Footnote 26: Eodem tempore petiit a Phocate principe templum, quod
appellatur Pantheon, in quo fecit ecclesiam SanctæMariæsemper Virginis,
et omnium martyrum; in quâecclesiæprinceps multa bona obtulit,
(Anastasius vel potius Liber Pontificalis in Bonifacio IV., in Muratori,
Script. Rerum Italicarum, tom. iii. P. i. p. 135.) According to the
anonymous writer in Montfaucon, the Pantheon had been vowed by Agrippa
to Cybele and Neptune, and was dedicated by Boniface IV., on the calends
of November, to the Virgin, quæest mater omnium sanctorum, (p. 297,
298.)]

[Footnote *: The popes, under the dominion of the emperor and of the
exarchs, according to Feas's just observation, did not possess the power
of disposing of the buildings and monuments of the city according to
their own will. Bunsen and Platner, vol. i. p. 241. -- M.]

III. The value of any object that supplies the wants or pleasures of
mankind is compounded of its substance and its form, of the materials
and the manufacture. Its price must depend on the number of persons by
whom it may be acquired and used; on the extent of the market; and
consequently on the ease or difficulty of remote exportation, according
to the nature of the commodity, its local situation, and the temporary
circumstances of the world. The Barbarian conquerors of Rome usurped in
a moment the toil and treasure of successive ages; but, except the
luxuries of immediate consumption, they must view without desire all
that could not be removed from the city in the Gothic wagons or the
fleet of the Vandals. ^27 Gold and silver were the first objects of
their avarice; as in every country, and in the smallest compass, they
represent the most ample command of the industry and possessions of
mankind. A vase or a statue of those precious metals might tempt the
vanity of some Barbarian chief; but the grosser multitude, regardless of
the form, was tenacious only of the substance; and the melted ingots
might be readily divided and stamped into the current coin of the
empire. The less active or less fortunate robbers were reduced to the
baser plunder of brass, lead, iron, and copper: whatever had escaped the
Goths and Vandals was pillaged by the Greek tyrants; and the emperor
Constans, in his rapacious visit, stripped the bronze tiles from the
roof of the Pantheon. ^28 The edifices of Rome might be considered as a
vast and various mine; the first labor of extracting the materials was
already performed; the metals were purified and cast; the marbles were
hewn and polished; and after foreign and domestic rapine had been
satiated, the remains of the city, could a purchaser have been found,
were still venal. The monuments of antiquity had been left naked of
their precious ornaments; but the Romans would demolish with their own
hands the arches and walls, if the hope of profit could surpass the cost
of the labor and exportation. If Charlemagne had fixed in Italy the seat
of the Western empire, his genius would have aspired to restore, rather
than to violate, the works of the Cæsars; but policy confined the French
monarch to the forests of Germany; his taste could be gratified only by
destruction; and the new palace of Aix la Chapelle was decorated with
the marbles of Ravenna ^29 and Rome. ^30 Five hundred years after
Charlemagne, a king of Sicily, Robert, the wisest and most liberal
sovereign of the age, was supplied with the same materials by the easy
navigation of the Tyber and the sea; and Petrarch sighs an indignant
complaint, that the ancient capital of the world should adorn from her
own bowels the slothful luxury of Naples. ^31 But these examples of
plunder or purchase were rare in the darker ages; and the Romans, alone
and unenvied, might have applied to their private or public use the
remaining structures of antiquity, if in their present form and
situation they had not been useless in a great measure to the city and
its inhabitants. The walls still described the old circumference, but
the city had descended from the seven hills into the Campus Martius; and
some of the noblest monuments which had braved the injuries of time were
left in a desert, far remote from the habitations of mankind. The
palaces of the senators were no longer adapted to the manners or
fortunes of their indigent successors: the use of baths ^32 and porticos
was forgotten: in the sixth century, the games of the theatre,
amphitheatre, and circus, had been interrupted: some temples were
devoted to the prevailing worship; but the Christian churches preferred
the holy figure of the cross; and fashion, or reason, had distributed
after a peculiar model the cells and offices of the cloister. Under the
ecclesiastical reign, the number of these pious foundations was
enormously multiplied; and the city was crowded with forty monasteries
of men, twenty of women, and sixty chapters and colleges of canons and
priests, ^33 who aggravated, instead of relieving, the depopulation of
the tenth century. But if the forms of ancient architecture were
disregarded by a people insensible of their use and beauty, the
plentiful materials were applied to every call of necessity or
superstition; till the fairest columns of the Ionic and Corinthian
orders, the richest marbles of Paros and Numidia, were degraded, perhaps
to the support of a convent or a stable. The daily havoc which is
perpetrated by the Turks in the cities of Greece and Asia may afford a
melancholy example; and in the gradual destruction of the monuments of
Rome, Sixtus the Fifth may alone be excused for employing the stones of
the Septizonium in the glorious edifice of St. Peter's. ^34 A fragment,
a ruin, howsoever mangled or profaned, may be viewed with pleasure and
regret; but the greater part of the marble was deprived of substance, as
well as of place and proportion; it was burnt to lime for the purpose of
cement. ^* Since the arrival of Poggius, the temple of Concord, ^35 and
many capital structures, had vanished from his eyes; and an epigram of
the same age expresses a just and pious fear, that the continuance of
this practice would finally annihilate all the monuments of antiquity.
^36 The smallness of their numbers was the sole check on the demands and
depredations of the Romans. The imagination of Petrarch might create the
presence of a mighty people; ^37 and I hesitate to believe, that, even
in the fourteenth century, they could be reduced to a contemptible list
of thirty-three thousand inhabitants. From that period to the reign of
Leo the Tenth, if they multiplied to the amount of eighty-five thousand,
^38 the increase of citizens was in some degree pernicious to the
ancient city.

[Footnote 27: Flaminius Vacca (apud Montfaucon, p. 155, 156. His memoir
is likewise printed, p. 21, at the end of the Roman Antica of Nardini)
and several Romans, doctrinâgraves, were persuaded that the Goths buried
their treasures at Rome, and bequeathed the secret marks filiis
nepotibusque. He relates some anecdotes to prove, that in his own time,
these places were visited and rifled by the Transalpine pilgrims, the
heirs of the Gothic conquerors.]

[Footnote 28: Omnia quæerant in ære ad ornatum civitatis deposuit, sed e
ecclesiam B. Mariæad martyres quæde tegulis æreis cooperta discooperuit,
(Anast. in Vitalian. p. 141.) The base and sacrilegious Greek had not
even the poor pretence of plundering a heathen temple, the Pantheon was
already a Catholic church.]

[Footnote 29: For the spoils of Ravenna (musiva atque marmora) see the
original grant of Pope Adrian I. to Charlemagne, (Codex Carolin. epist.
lxvii. in Muratori, Script. Ital. tom. iii. P. ii. p. 223.)]

[Footnote 30: I shall quote the authentic testimony of the Saxon poet,
(A.D. 887--899,) de Rebus gestis Caroli magni, l. v. 437--440, in the
Historians of France, (tom. v. p. 180:)

Ad quæmarmoreas præstabat Roma columnas,

Quasdam præcipuas pulchra Ravenna dedit.

De tam longinquâpoterit regione vetustas

Illius ornatum, Francia, ferre tibi.

And I shall add from the Chronicle of Sigebert, (Historians of France,
tom. v. p. 378,) extruxit etiam Aquisgrani basilicam
plurimæpulchritudinis, ad cujus structuram a Roma et Ravenna columnas et
marmora devehi fecit.]

[Footnote 31: I cannot refuse to transcribe a long passage of Petrarch
(Opp. p. 536, 537) in Epistolâhortatoriâad Nicolaum Laurentium; it is so
strong and full to the point: Nec pudor aut pietas continuit quominus
impii spoliata Dei templa, occupatas arces, opes publicas, regiones
urbis, atque honores magistratûum inter se divisos; (habeant?) quam
unâin re, turbulenti ac seditiosi homines et totius reliquævitæconsiliis
et rationibus discordes, inhumani fderis stupendàsocietate convenirent,
in pontes et mnia atque immeritos lapides desævirent. Denique post vi
vel senio collapsa palatia, quæquondam ingentes tenuerunt viri, post
diruptos arcus triumphales, (unde majores horum forsitan corruerunt,) de
ipsius vetustatis ac propriæimpietatis fragminibus vilem quæstum turpi
mercimonio captare non puduit. Itaque nunc, heu dolor! heu scelus
indignum! de vestris marmoreis columnis, de liminibus templorum, (ad
quænuper ex orbe toto concursus devotissimus fiebat,) de imaginibus
sepulchrorum sub quibus patrum vestrorum venerabilis civis (cinis?)
erat, ut reliquas sileam, desidiosa Neapolis adornatur. Sic paullatim
ruinæipsædeficiunt. Yet King Robert was the friend of Petrarch.]

[Footnote 32: Yet Charlemagne washed and swam at Aix la Chapelle with a
hundred of his courtiers, (Eginhart, c. 22, p. 108, 109,) and Muratori
describes, as late as the year 814, the public baths which were built at
Spoleto in Italy, (Annali, tom. vi. p. 416.)]

[Footnote 33: See the Annals of Italy, A.D. 988. For this and the
preceding fact, Muratori himself is indebted to the Benedictine history
of Père Mabillon.]

[Footnote 34: Vita di Sisto Quinto, da Gregorio Leti, tom. iii. p. 50.]

[Footnote *: From the quotations in Bunsen's Dissertation, it may be
suspected that this slow but continual process of destruction was the
most fatal. Ancient Rome eas considered a quarry from which the church,
the castle of the baron, or even the hovel of the peasant, might be
repaired. -- M.]

[Footnote 35: Porticus ædis Concordiæ, quam cum primum ad urbem accessi
vidi fere integram opere marmoreo admodum specioso: Romani postmodum ad
calcem ædem totam et porticûs partem disjectis columnis sunt demoliti,
(p. 12.) The temple of Concord was therefore notdestroyed by a sedition
in the xiiith century, as I have read in a MS. treatise del' Governo
civile di Rome, lent me formerly at Rome, and ascribed (I believe
falsely) to the celebrated Gravina. Poggius likewise affirms that the
sepulchre of Cæcilia Metella was burnt for lime, (p. 19, 20.)]

[Footnote 36: Composed by Æneas Sylvius, afterwards Pope Pius II., and
published by Mabillon, from a MS. of the queen of Sweden, (Musæum
Italicum, tom. i. p. 97.)

Oblectat me, Roma, tuas spectare ruinas:

Ex cujus lapsûgloria prisca patet.

Sed tuus hic populus muris defossa vetustis

Calcis in obsequiummarmora dura coquit.

Impia tercentum si sic gens egerit annos

Nullum hinc indicium nobilitatis erit.

11]

[Footnote 37: Vagabamur pariter in illâurbe tam magnâ; quæ, cum propter
spatium vacua videretur, populum habet immensum, (Opp p. 605 Epist.
Familiares, ii. 14.)]

[Footnote 38: These states of the population of Rome at different
periods are derived from an ingenious treatise of the physician Lancisi,
de Romani Cli Qualitatibus, (p. 122.)]

IV. I have reserved for the last, the most potent and forcible cause of
destruction, the domestic hostilities of the Romans themselves. Under
the dominion of the Greek and French emperors, the peace of the city was
disturbed by accidental, though frequent, seditions: it is from the
decline of the latter, from the beginning of the tenth century, that we
may date the licentiousness of private war, which violated with impunity
the laws of the Code and the Gospel, without respecting the majesty of
the absent sovereign, or the presence and person of the vicar of Christ.
In a dark period of five hundred years, Rome was perpetually afflicted
by the sanguinary quarrels of the nobles and the people, the Guelphs and
Ghibelines, the Colonna and Ursini; and if much has escaped the
knowledge, and much is unworthy of the notice, of history, I have
exposed in the two preceding chapters the causes and effects of the
public disorders. At such a time, when every quarrel was decided by the
sword, and none could trust their lives or properties to the impotence
of law, the powerful citizens were armed for safety, or offence, against
the domestic enemies whom they feared or hated. Except Venice alone, the
same dangers and designs were common to all the free republics of Italy;
and the nobles usurped the prerogative of fortifying their houses, and
erecting strong towers, ^39 that were capable of resisting a sudden
attack. The cities were filled with these hostile edifices; and the
example of Lucca, which contained three hundred towers; her law, which
confined their height to the measure of fourscore feet, may be extended
with suitable latitude to the more opulent and populous states. The
first step of the senator Brancaleone in the establishment of peace and
justice, was to demolish (as we have already seen) one hundred and forty
of the towers of Rome; and, in the last days of anarchy and discord, as
late as the reign of Martin the Fifth, forty-four still stood in one of
the thirteen or fourteen regions of the city. To this mischievous
purpose the remains of antiquity were most readily adapted: the temples
and arches afforded a broad and solid basis for the new structures of
brick and stone; and we can name the modern turrets that were raised on
the triumphal monuments of Julius Cæsar, Titus, and the Antonines. ^40
With some slight alterations, a theatre, an amphitheatre, a mausoleum,
was transformed into a strong and spacious citadel. I need not repeat,
that the mole of Adrian has assumed the title and form of the castle of
St. Angelo; ^41 the Septizonium of Severus was capable of standing
against a royal army; ^42 the sepulchre of Metella has sunk under its
outworks; ^43 ^* the theatres of Pompey and Marcellus were occupied by
the Savelli and Ursini families; ^44 and the rough fortress has been
gradually softened to the splendor and elegance of an Italian palace.
Even the churches were encompassed with arms and bulwarks, and the
military engines on the roof of St. Peter's were the terror of the
Vatican and the scandal of the Christian world. Whatever is fortified
will be attacked; and whatever is attacked may be destroyed. Could the
Romans have wrested from the popes the castle of St. Angelo, they had
resolved by a public decree to annihilate that monument of servitude.
Every building of defence was exposed to a siege; and in every siege the
arts and engines of destruction were laboriously employed. After the
death of Nicholas the Fourth, Rome, without a sovereign or a senate, was
abandoned six months to the fury of civil war. "The houses," says a
cardinal and poet of the times, ^45 "were crushed by the weight and
velocity of enormous stones; ^46 the walls were perforated by the
strokes of the battering-ram; the towers were involved in fire and
smoke; and the assailants were stimulated by rapine and revenge." The
work was consummated by the tyranny of the laws; and the factions of
Italy alternately exercised a blind and thoughtless vengeance on their
adversaries, whose houses and castles they razed to the ground. ^47 In
comparing the daysof foreign, with the agesof domestic, hostility, we
must pronounce, that the latter have been far more ruinous to the city;
and our opinion is confirmed by the evidence of Petrarch. "Behold," says
the laureate, "the relics of Rome, the image of her pristine greatness!
neither time nor the Barbarian can boast the merit of this stupendous
destruction: it was perpetrated by her own citizens, by the most
illustrious of her sons; and your ancestors (he writes to a noble
Annabaldi) have done with the battering-ram what the Punic hero could
not accomplish with the sword." ^48 The influence of the two last
principles of decay must in some degree be multiplied by each other;
since the houses and towers, which were subverted by civil war, required
by a new and perpetual supply from the monuments of antiquity. ^*

[Footnote 39: All the facts that relate to the towers at Rome, and in
other free cities of Italy, may be found in the laborious and
entertaining compilation of Muratori, Antiquitates ItaliæMedii Ævi,
dissertat. xxvi., (tom. ii. p. 493--496, of the Latin, tom. . p. 446, of
the Italian work.)]

[Footnote 40: As for instance, templum Jani nunc dicitur, turris Centii
Frangipanis; et sane Jano impositæturris lateritiæconspicua hodieque
vestigia supersunt, (Montfaucon Diarium Italicum, p. 186.) The anonymous
writer (p. 285) enumerates, arcus Titi, turris Cartularia; arcus Julii
Cæsaris et Senatorum, turres de Bratis; arcus Antonini, turris de
Cosectis, &c.]

[Footnote 41: Hadriani molem . . . . magna ex parte Romanorum injuria .
. . . disturbavit; quod certe funditus evertissent, si eorum manibus
pervia, absumptis grandibus saxis, reliqua moles exstisset, (Poggius de
Varietate Fortunæ, p. 12.)]

[Footnote 42: Against the emperor Henry IV., (Muratori, Annali d'
Italia, tom. ix. p. 147.)]

[Footnote 43: I must copy an important passage of Montfaucon: Turris
ingens rotunda . . . . CæciliæMetellæ. . . . sepulchrum erat, cujus muri
tam solidi, ut spatium perquam minimum intus vacuum supersit; et Torre
di Bovedicitur, a boum capitibus muro inscriptis. Huic sequiori ævo,
tempore intestinorum bellorum, ceu urbecula adjuncta fuit, cujus mnia et
turres etiamnum visuntur; ita ut sepulchrum Metellæquasi arx oppiduli
fuerit. Ferventibus in urbe partibus, cum Ursini atque Columnenses
mutuis cladibus perniciem inferrent civitati, in utriusve partis
ditionem cederet magni momenti erat, (p. 142.)]

[Footnote *: This is inaccurately expressed. The sepulchre is still
standing See Hobhouse, p. 204. -- M.]

[Footnote 44: See the testimonies of Donatus, Nardini, and Montfaucon.
In the Savelli palace, the remains of the theatre of Marcellus are still
great and conspicuous.]

[Footnote 45: James, cardinal of St. George, ad velum aureum, in his
metrical life of Pope Celestin V., (Muratori, Script. Ital. tom. i. P.
iii. p. 621, l. i. c. l. ver. 132, &c.)

Hoc dixisse sat est, Romam caruisee Senatû

Mensibus exactis heu sex; belloque vocatum (vocatos)

In scelus, in socios fraternaque vulnera patres;

Tormentis jecisse viros immania saxa;

Perfodisse domus trabibus, fecisse ruinas

Ignibus; incensas turres, obscuraque fumo

Lumina vicino, quo sit spoliata supellex.

11]

[Footnote 46: Muratori (Dissertazione sopra le AntiquitàItaliane, tom.
i. p. 427--431) finds that stone bullets of two or three hundred pounds'
weight were not uncommon; and they are sometimes computed at xii. or
xviii cantariof Genoa, each cantaroweighing 150 pounds.]

[Footnote 47: The vith law of the Visconti prohibits this common and
mischievous practice; and strictly enjoins, that the houses of banished
citizens should be preserved pro communi utilitate, (Gualvancus de la
Flamma in Muratori, Script. Rerum Italicarum, tom. xii. p. 1041.)]

[Footnote 48: Petrarch thus addresses his friend, who, with shame and
tears had shown him the mnia, laceræspecimen miserable Romæ, and
declared his own intention of restoring them, (Carmina Latina, l. ii.
epist. Paulo Annibalensi, xii. p. 97, 98.)

Nec te parva manet servatis fama ruinis

Quanta quod integræfuit olim gloria Romæ

Reliquiætestantur adhuc; quas longior ætas

Frangere non valuit; non vis aut ira cruenti Hostis,

ab egregiis franguntur civibus, heu! heu'

-------- Quod illenequivit (Hannibal.)

Perficit hic aries. 11]

[Footnote *: Bunsen has shown that the hostile attacks of the emperor
Henry the Fourth, but more particularly that of Robert Guiscard, who
burned down whole districts, inflicted the worst damage on the ancient
city Vol. i. p. 247. -- M.]

Chapter LXXI: Prospect Of The Ruins Of Rome In The Fifteenth Century. --
Part II.

These general observations may be separately applied to the amphitheatre
of Titus, which has obtained the name of the Coliseum, ^49 either from
its magnitude, or from Nero's colossal statue; an edifice, had it been
left to time and nature, which might perhaps have claimed an eternal
duration. The curious antiquaries, who have computed the numbers and
seats, are disposed to believe, that above the upper row of stone steps
the amphitheatre was encircled and elevated with several stages of
wooden galleries, which were repeatedly consumed by fire, and restored
by the emperors. Whatever was precious, or portable, or profane, the
statues of gods and heroes, and the costly ornaments of sculpture which
were cast in brass, or overspread with leaves of silver and gold, became
the first prey of conquest or fanaticism, of the avarice of the
Barbarians or the Christians. In the massy stones of the Coliseum, many
holes are discerned; and the two most probable conjectures represent the
various accidents of its decay. These stones were connected by solid
links of brass or iron, nor had the eye of rapine overlooked the value
of the baser metals; ^50 the vacant space was converted into a fair or
market; the artisans of the Coliseum are mentioned in an ancient survey;
and the chasms were perforated or enlarged to receive the poles that
supported the shops or tents of the mechanic trades. ^51 Reduced to its
naked majesty, the Flavian amphitheatre was contemplated with awe and
admiration by the pilgrims of the North; and their rude enthusiasm broke
forth in a sublime proverbial expression, which is recorded in the
eighth century, in the fragments of the venerable Bede: "As long as the
Coliseum stands, Rome shall stand; when the Coliseum falls, Rome will
fall; when Rome falls, the world will fall." ^52 In the modern system of
war, a situation commanded by three hills would not be chosen for a
fortress; but the strength of the walls and arches could resist the
engines of assault; a numerous garrison might be lodged in the
enclosure; and while one faction occupied the Vatican and the Capitol,
the other was intrenched in the Lateran and the Coliseum. ^53

[Footnote 49: The fourth part of the Verona Illustrata of the marquis
Maffei professedly treats of amphitheatres, particularly those of Rome
and Verona, of their dimensions, wooden galleries, &c. It is from
magnitude that he derives the name of Colosseum, or Coliseum; since the
same appellation was applied to the amphitheatre of Capua, without the
aid of a colossal statue; since that of Nero was erected in the court
(in atrio) of his palace, and not in the Coliseum, (P. iv. p. 15--19, l.
i. c. 4.)]

[Footnote 50: Joseph Maria Suarés, a learned bishop, and the author of a
history of Præneste, has composed a separate dissertation on the seven
or eight probable causes of these holes, which has been since reprinted
in the Roman Thesaurus of Sallengre. Montfaucon (Diarium, p. 233)
pronounces the rapine of the Barbarians to be the unam germanamque
causam foraminum. *

Note: * The improbability of this theory is shown by Bunsen, vol. i. p.
239. -- M.]

[Footnote 51: Donatus, Roma Vetus et Nova, p. 285.

Note:  Gibbon has followed Donatus, who supposes that a silk manufactory
was established in the xiith century in the Coliseum. The Bandonarii, or
Bandererii, were the officers who carried the standards of their
schoolbefore the pope. Hobhouse, p. 269. -- M.]

[Footnote 52: Quamdiu stabit Colyseus, stabit et Roma; quando cadet Coly
seus, cadet Roma; quando cadet Roma, cadet et mundus, (Beda in Excerptis
seu Collectaneis apud Ducange Glossar. Med. et InfimæLatinitatis, tom.
ii. p. 407, edit. Basil.) This saying must be ascribed to the
Anglo-Saxon pilgrims who visited Rome before the year 735 the æra of
Bede's death; for I do not believe that our venerable monk ever passed
the sea.]

[Footnote 53: I cannot recover, in Muratori's original Lives of the
Popes, (Script Rerum Italicarum, tom. iii. P. i.,) the passage that
attests this hostile partition, which must be applied to the end of the
xiith or the beginning of the xiith century.

Note:  "The division is mentioned in Vit. Innocent. Pap. II. ex
Cardinale Aragonio, (Script. Rer. Ital. vol. iii. P. i. p. 435,) and
Gibbon might have found frequent other records of it at other dates."
Hobhouse's Illustrations of Childe Harold. p. 130. -- M.]

The abolition at Rome of the ancient games must be understood with some
latitude; and the carnival sports, of the Testacean mount and the Circus
Agonalis, ^54 were regulated by the law ^55 or custom of the city. The
senator presided with dignity and pomp to adjudge and distribute the
prizes, the gold ring, or the pallium, ^56 as it was styled, of cloth or
silk. A tribute on the Jews supplied the annual expense; ^57 and the
races, on foot, on horseback, or in chariots, were ennobled by a tilt
and tournament of seventy-two of the Roman youth. In the year one
thousand three hundred and thirty-two, a bull-feast, after the fashion
of the Moors and Spaniards, was celebrated in the Coliseum itself; and
the living manners are painted in a diary of the times. ^58 A convenient
order of benches was restored; and a general proclamation, as far as
Rimini and Ravenna, invited the nobles to exercise their skill and
courage in this perilous adventure. The Roman ladies were marshalled in
three squadrons, and seated in three balconies, which, on this day, the
third of September, were lined with scarlet cloth. The fair Jacova di
Rovere led the matrons from beyond the Tyber, a pure and native race,
who still represent the features and character of antiquity. The
remainder of the city was divided as usual between the Colonna and
Ursini: the two factions were proud of the number and beauty of their
female bands: the charms of Savella Ursini are mentioned with praise;
and the Colonna regretted the absence of the youngest of their house,
who had sprained her ankle in the garden of Nero's tower. The lots of
the champions were drawn by an old and respectable citizen; and they
descended into the arena, or pit, to encounter the wild bulls, on foot
as it should seem, with a single spear. Amidst the crowd, our annalist
has selected the names, colors, and devices, of twenty of the most
conspicuous knights. Several of the names are the most illustrious of
Rome and the ecclesiastical state: Malatesta, Polenta, della Valle,
Cafarello, Savelli, Capoccio, Conti, Annibaldi, Altieri, Corsi: the
colors were adapted to their taste and situation; the devices are
expressive of hope or despair, and breathe the spirit of gallantry and
arms. "I am alone, like the youngest of the Horatii," the confidence of
an intrepid stranger: "I live disconsolate," a weeping widower: "I burn
under the ashes," a discreet lover: "I adore Lavinia, or Lucretia," the
ambiguous declaration of a modern passion: "My faith is as pure," the
motto of a white livery: "Who is stronger than myself?" of a lion's
hide: "If am drowned in blood, what a pleasant death!" the wish of
ferocious courage. The pride or prudence of the Ursini restrained them
from the field, which was occupied by three of their hereditary rivals,
whose inscriptions denoted the lofty greatness of the Colonna name:
"Though sad, I am strong:" "Strong as I am great:" "If I fall,"
addressing himself to the spectators, "you fall with me;" -- intimating
(says the contemporary writer) that while the other families were the
subjects of the Vatican, they alone were the supporters of the Capitol.
The combats of the amphitheatre were dangerous and bloody. Every
champion successively encountered a wild bull; and the victory may be
ascribed to the quadrupeds, since no more than eleven were left on the
field, with the loss of nine wounded and eighteen killed on the side of
their adversaries. Some of the noblest families might mourn, but the
pomp of the funerals, in the churches of St. John Lateran and St. Maria
Maggiore, afforded a second holiday to the people. Doubtless it was not
in such conflicts that the blood of the Romans should have been shed;
yet, in blaming their rashness, we are compelled to applaud their
gallantry; and the noble volunteers, who display their magnificence, and
risk their lives, under the balconies of the fair, excite a more
generous sympathy than the thousands of captives and malefactors who
were reluctantly dragged to the scene of slaughter. ^59

[Footnote 54: Although the structure of the circus Agonalis be
destroyed, it still retains its form and name, (Agona, Nagona, Navona;)
and the interior space affords a sufficient level for the purpose of
racing. But the Monte Testaceo, that strange pile of broken pottery,
seems only adapted for the annual practice of hurling from top to bottom
some wagon-loads of live hogs for the diversion of the populace,
(Statuta Urbis Romæ, p. 186.)]

[Footnote 55: See the Statuta Urbis Romæ, l. iii. c. 87, 88, 89, p. 185,
186. I have already given an idea of this municipal code. The races of
Nagona and Monte Testaceo are likewise mentioned in the Diary of Peter
Antonius from 1404 to 1417, (Muratori, Script. Rerum Italicarum, tom.
xxiv. p. 1124.)]

[Footnote 56: The Pallium, which Menage so foolishly derives from
Palmarius, is an easy extension of the idea and the words, from the robe
or cloak, to the materials, and from thence to their application as a
prize, (Muratori, dissert. xxxiii.)]

[Footnote 57: For these expenses, the Jews of Rome paid each year 1130
florins, of which the odd thirty represented the pieces of silver for
which Judas had betrayed his Master to their ancestors. There was a
foot-race of Jewish as well as of Christian youths, (Statuta Urbis,
ibidem.)]

[Footnote 58: This extraordinary bull-feast in the Coliseum is
described, from tradition rather than memory, by Ludovico Buonconte
Monaldesco, on the most ancient fragments of Roman annals, (Muratori,
Script Rerum Italicarum, tom. xii. p. 535, 536;) and however fanciful
they may seem, they are deeply marked with the colors of truth and
nature.]

[Footnote 59: Muratori has given a separate dissertation (the xxixth) to
the games of the Italians in the Middle Ages.]

This use of the amphitheatre was a rare, perhaps a singular, festival:
the demand for the materials was a daily and continual want which the
citizens could gratify without restraint or remorse. In the fourteenth
century, a scandalous act of concord secured to both factions the
privilege of extracting stones from the free and common quarry of the
Coliseum; ^60 and Poggius laments, that the greater part of these stones
had been burnt to lime by the folly of the Romans. ^61 To check this
abuse, and to prevent the nocturnal crimes that might be perpetrated in
the vast and gloomy recess, Eugenius the Fourth surrounded it with a
wall; and, by a charter long extant, granted both the ground and edifice
to the monks of an adjacent convent. ^62 After his death, the wall was
overthrown in a tumult of the people; and had they themselves respected
the noblest monument of their fathers, they might have justified the
resolve that it should never be degraded to private property. The inside
was damaged: but in the middle of the sixteenth century, an æra of taste
and learning, the exterior circumference of one thousand six hundred and
twelve feet was still entire and inviolate; a triple elevation of
fourscore arches, which rose to the height of one hundred and eight
feet. Of the present ruin, the nephews of Paul the Third are the guilty
agents; and every traveller who views the Farnese palace may curse the
sacrilege and luxury of these upstart princes. ^63 A similar reproach is
applied to the Barberini; and the repetition of injury might be dreaded
from every reign, till the Coliseum was placed under the safeguard of
religion by the most liberal of the pontiffs, Benedict the Fourteenth,
who consecrated a spot which persecution and fable had stained with the
blood of so many Christian martyrs. ^64

[Footnote 60: In a concise but instructive memoir, the abbéBarthelemy
(Mémoires de l'Académie des Inscriptions, tom. xxviii. p. 585) has
mentioned this agreement of the factions of the xivth century de
Tiburtino faciendo in the Coliseum, from an original act in the archives
of Rome.]

[Footnote 61: Coliseum . . . . ob stultitiam Romanorum majori ex partead
calcem deletum, says the indignant Poggius, (p. 17:) but his expression
too strong for the present age, must be very tenderly applied to the
xvth century.]

[Footnote 62: Of the Olivetan monks. Montfaucon (p. 142) affirms this
fact from the memorials of Flaminius Vacca, (No. 72.) They still hoped
on some future occasion, to revive and vindicate their grant.]

[Footnote 63: After measuring the priscus amphitheatri gyrus, Montfaucon
(p. 142) only adds that it was entire under Paul III.; tacendo clamat.
Muratori (Annali d'Italia, tom. xiv. p. 371) more freely reports the
guilt of the Farnese pope, and the indignation of the Roman people.
Against the nephews of Urban VIII. I have no other evidence than the
vulgar saying, "Quod non fecerunt Barbari, fecere Barberini," which was
perhaps suggested by the resemblance of the words.]

[Footnote 64: As an antiquarian and a priest, Montfaucon thus deprecates
the ruin of the Coliseum: Quòd si non suopte merito atque pulchritudine
dignum fuisset quod improbas arceret manus, indigna res utique in locum
tot martyrum cruore sacrum tantopere sævitum esse.]

When Petrarch first gratified his eyes with a view of those monuments,
whose scattered fragments so far surpass the most eloquent descriptions,
he was astonished at the supine indifference ^65 of the Romans
themselves; ^66 he was humbled rather than elated by the discovery,
that, except his friend Rienzi, and one of the Colonna, a stranger of
the Rhône was more conversant with these antiquities than the nobles and
natives of the metropolis. ^67 The ignorance and credulity of the Romans
are elaborately displayed in the old survey of the city which was
composed about the beginning of the thirteenth century; and, without
dwelling on the manifold errors of name and place, the legend of the
Capitol ^68 may provoke a smile of contempt and indignation. "The
Capitol," says the anonymous writer, "is so named as being the head of
the world; where the consuls and senators formerly resided for the
government of the city and the globe. The strong and lofty walls were
covered with glass and gold, and crowned with a roof of the richest and
most curious carving. Below the citadel stood a palace, of gold for the
greatest part, decorated with precious stones, and whose value might be
esteemed at one third of the world itself. The statues of all the
provinces were arranged in order, each with a small bell suspended from
its neck; and such was the contrivance of art magic, ^69 that if the
province rebelled against Rome, the statue turned round to that quarter
of the heavens, the bell rang, the prophet of the Capitol repeated the
prodigy, and the senate was admonished of the impending danger." A
second example, of less importance, though of equal absurdity, may be
drawn from the two marble horses, led by two naked youths, who have
since been transported from the baths of Constantine to the Quirinal
hill. The groundless application of the names of Phidias and Praxiteles
may perhaps be excused; but these Grecian sculptors should not have been
removed above four hundred years from the age of Pericles to that of
Tiberius; they should not have been transferred into two philosophers or
magicians, whose nakedness was the symbol of truth or knowledge, who
revealed to the emperor his most secret actions; and, after refusing all
pecuniary recompense, solicited the honor of leaving this eternal
monument of themselves. ^70 Thus awake to the power of magic, the Romans
were insensible to the beauties of art: no more than five statues were
visible to the eyes of Poggius; and of the multitudes which chance or
design had buried under the ruins, the resurrection was fortunately
delayed till a safer and more enlightened age. ^71 The Nile which now
adorns the Vatican, had been explored by some laborers in digging a
vineyard near the temple, or convent, of the Minerva; but the impatient
proprietor, who was tormented by some visits of curiosity, restored the
unprofitable marble to its former grave. ^72 The discovery of a statue
of Pompey, ten feet in length, was the occasion of a lawsuit. It had
been found under a partition wall: the equitable judge had pronounced,
that the head should be separated from the body to satisfy the claims of
the contiguous owners; and the sentence would have been executed, if the
intercession of a cardinal, and the liberality of a pope, had not
rescued the Roman hero from the hands of his barbarous countrymen. ^73

[Footnote 65: Yet the statutes of Rome (l. iii. c. 81, p. 182) impose a
fine of 500 aureion whosoever shall demolish any ancient edifice, ne
ruinis civitas deformetur, et ut antiqua ædificia decorem urbis perpetuo
representent.]

[Footnote 66: In his first visit to Rome (A.D. 1337. See Mémoires sur
Pétrarque, tom. i. p. 322, &c.) Petrarch is struck mute miraculo rerum
tantarum, et stuporis mole obrutus . . . . Præsentia vero, mirum
dictûnihil imminuit: vere major fuit Roma majoresque sunt reliquiæquam
rebar. Jam non orbem ab hâc urbe domitum, sed tam sero domitum, miror,
(Opp. p. 605, Familiares, ii. 14, Joanni Columnæ.)]

[Footnote 67: He excepts and praises the rareknowledge of John Colonna.
Qui enim hodie magis ignari rerum Romanarum, quam Romani cives! Invitus
dico, nusquam minus Roma cognoscitur quam Romæ.]

[Footnote 68: After the description of the Capitol, he adds, statuæerant
quot sunt mundi provinciæ; et habebat quælibet tintinnabulum ad collum.
Et erant ita per magicam artem dispositæ, ut quando aliqua regio Romano
Imperio rebellis erat, statim imago illius provinciævertebat se contra
illam; unde tintinnabulum resonabat quod pendebat ad collum; tuncque
vates Capitolii qui erant custodes senatui, &c. He mentions an example
of the Saxons and Suevi, who, after they had been subdued by Agrippa,
again rebelled: tintinnabulum sonuit; sacerdos qui erat in speculo in
hebdomada senatoribus nuntiavit: Agrippa marched back and reduced the --
Persians, (Anonym. in Montfaucon, p. 297, 298.)]

[Footnote 69: The same writer affirms, that Virgil captus a Romanis
invisibiliter exiit, ivitque Neapolim. A Roman magician, in the xith
century, is introduced by William of Malmsbury, (de Gestis Regum
Anglorum, l. ii. p. 86;) and in the time of Flaminius Vacca (No. 81,
103) it was the vulgar belief that the strangers (the Goths) invoked the
dæmons for the discovery of hidden treasures.]

[Footnote 70: Anonym. p. 289. Montfaucon (p. 191) justly observes, that
if Alexander be represented, these statues cannot be the work of Phidias
(Olympiad lxxxiii.) or Praxiteles, (Olympiad civ.,) who lived before
that conqueror (Plin. Hist. Natur. xxxiv. 19.)]

[Footnote 71: William of Malmsbury (l. ii. p. 86, 87) relates a
marvellous discovery (A.D. 1046) of Pallas the son of Evander, who had
been slain by Turnus; the perpetual light in his sepulchre, a Latin
epitaph, the corpse, yet entire, of a young giant, the enormous wound in
his breast, (pectus perforat ingens,) &c. If this fable rests on the
slightest foundation, we may pity the bodies, as well as the statues,
that were exposed to the air in a barbarous age.]

[Footnote 72: Prope porticum Minervæ, statua est recubantis, cujus caput
integrâeffigie tantæmagnitudinis, ut signa omnia excedat. Quidam ad
plantandas arbores scrobes faciens detexit. Ad hoc visendum cum plures
in dies magis concurrerent, strepitum adeuentium fastidiumque pertæsus,
horti patronus congestâhumo texit, (Poggius de Varietate Fortunæ, p.
12.)]

[Footnote 73: See the Memorials of Flaminius Vacca, No. 57, p. 11, 12,
at the end of the Roma Antica of Nardini, (1704, in 4to.)]

But the clouds of barbarism were gradually dispelled; and the peaceful
authority of Martin the Fifth and his successors restored the ornaments
of the city as well as the order of the ecclesiastical state. The
improvements of Rome, since the fifteenth century, have not been the
spontaneous produce of freedom and industry. The first and most natural
root of a great city is the labor and populousness of the adjacent
country, which supplies the materials of subsistence, of manufactures,
and of foreign trade. But the greater part of the Campagna of Rome is
reduced to a dreary and desolate wilderness: the overgrown estates of
the princes and the clergy are cultivated by the lazy hands of indigent
and hopeless vassals; and the scanty harvests are confined or exported
for the benefit of a monopoly. A second and more artificial cause of the
growth of a metropolis is the residence of a monarch, the expense of a
luxurious court, and the tributes of dependent provinces. Those
provinces and tributes had been lost in the fall of the empire; and if
some streams of the silver of Peru and the gold of Brazil have been
attracted by the Vatican, the revenues of the cardinals, the fees of
office, the oblations of pilgrims and clients, and the remnant of
ecclesiastical taxes, afford a poor and precarious supply, which
maintains, however, the idleness of the court and city. The population
of Rome, far below the measure of the great capitals of Europe, does not
exceed one hundred and seventy thousand inhabitants; ^74 and within the
spacious enclosure of the walls, the largest portion of the seven hills
is overspread with vineyards and ruins. The beauty and splendor of the
modern city may be ascribed to the abuses of the government, to the
influence of superstition. Each reign (the exceptions are rare) has been
marked by the rapid elevation of a new family, enriched by the childish
pontiff at the expense of the church and country. The palaces of these
fortunate nephews are the most costly monuments of elegance and
servitude: the perfect arts of architecture, sculpture, and painting,
have been prostituted in their service; and their galleries and gardens
are decorated with the most precious works of antiquity, which taste or
vanity has prompted them to collect. The ecclesiastical revenues were
more decently employed by the popes themselves in the pomp of the
Catholic worship; but it is superfluous to enumerate their pious
foundations of altars, chapels, and churches, since these lesser stars
are eclipsed by the sun of the Vatican, by the dome of St. Peter, the
most glorious structure that ever has been applied to the use of
religion. The fame of Julius the Second, Leo the Tenth, and Sixtus the
Fifth, is accompanied by the superior merit of Bramante and Fontana, of
Raphael and Michael Angelo; and the same munificence which had been
displayed in palaces and temples was directed with equal zeal to revive
and emulate the labors of antiquity. Prostrate obelisks were raised from
the ground, and erected in the most conspicuous places; of the eleven
aqueducts of the Cæsars and consuls, three were restored; the artificial
rivers were conducted over a long series of old, or of new arches, to
discharge into marble basins a flood of salubrious and refreshing
waters: and the spectator, impatient to ascend the steps of St. Peter's,
is detained by a column of Egyptian granite, which rises between two
lofty and perpetual fountains, to the height of one hundred and twenty
feet. The map, the description, the monuments of ancient Rome, have been
elucidated by the diligence of the antiquarian and the student: ^75 and
the footsteps of heroes, the relics, not of superstition, but of empire,
are devoutly visited by a new race of pilgrims from the remote, and once
savage countries of the North.

[Footnote 74: In the year 1709, the inhabitants of Rome (without
including eight or ten thousand Jews,) amounted to 138,568 souls, (Labat
Voyages en Espagne et en Italie, tom. iii. p. 217, 218.) In 1740, they
had increased to 146,080; and in 1765, I left them, without the Jews
161,899. I am ignorant whether they have since continued in a
progressive state.]

[Footnote 75: The Père Montfaucon distributes his own observations into
twenty days; he should have styled them weeks, or months, of his visits
to the different parts of the city, (Diarium Italicum, c. 8--20, p.
104--301.) That learned Benedictine reviews the topographers of ancient
Rome; the first efforts of Blondus, Fulvius, Martianus, and Faunus, the
superior labors of Pyrrhus Ligorius, had his learning been equal to his
labors; the writings of Onuphrius Panvinius, qui omnes obscuravit, and
the recent but imperfect books of Donatus and Nardini. Yet Montfaucon
still sighs for a more complete plan and description of the old city,
which must be attained by the three following methods: 1. The
measurement of the space and intervals of the ruins. 2. The study of
inscriptions, and the places where they were found. 3. The investigation
of all the acts, charters, diaries of the middle ages, which name any
spot or building of Rome. The laborious work, such as Montfaucon
desired, must be promoted by princely or public munificence: but the
great modern plan of Nolli (A.D. 1748) would furnish a solid and
accurate basis for the ancient topography of Rome.]

Of these pilgrims, and of every reader, the attention will be excited by
a History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire; the greatest,
perhaps, and most awful scene in the history of mankind. The various
causes and progressive effects are connected with many of the events
most interesting in human annals: the artful policy of the Cæsars, who
long maintained the name and image of a free republic; the disorders of
military despotism; the rise, establishment, and sects of Christianity;
the foundation of Constantinople; the division of the monarchy; the
invasion and settlements of the Barbarians of Germany and Scythia; the
institutions of the civil law; the character and religion of Mahomet;
the temporal sovereignty of the popes; the restoration and decay of the
Western empire of Charlemagne; the crusades of the Latins in the East:
the conquests of the Saracens and Turks; the ruin of the Greek empire;
the state and revolutions of Rome in the middle age. The historian may
applaud the importance and variety of his subject; but while he is
conscious of his own imperfections, he must often accuse the deficiency
of his materials. It was among the ruins of the Capitol that I first
conceived the idea of a work which has amused and exercised near twenty
years of my life, and which, however inadequate to my own wishes, I
finally delivered to the curiosity and candor of the public.

Lausanne, June 27 1787