who composed every epistle, and attended every meeting, Eneas Sylvius,* 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 they are 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 dicipline? 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 Eneas, 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 alms. 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

*In the year 1454, Spondanus has given, from Eneas 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.

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.* His lofty genius aspired to the conquest of Italy:† he was possessed of a strong city and a capacious harbour; and the same reign might have been decorated with the trophies of the New and the Ancient Rome.‡

* 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 seventy 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 labours of John Sagredo. + [When Gibbon wrote, the Turkish empire, though sinking, was still powerful. Since that time, its decadence has been rapid. Without "hating the infidels," we may regret the supineness of a race so incapable of assisting the course of human improvement. In the fair regions which they misuse, the profusion of nature's beauties and bounties once nurtured the faculties of mind to a noble growth; while history discloses the influences which have blighted and withered, it ought also to teach us those which can revive and restore.-ED.]

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 Greek 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 (thirty-six 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 du Fresne du Cange. His supplemental works, the Greek Glossary, the Constantinopolis Christiana, the Familiæ Byza tinæ, diffuse a steady light over the darkness of the lower empire. [The Bonn edition of these writers, commenced by M. Niebuhr, and completed by his coadjutors, Bekker, Schopen, and others, presents them to us in a more convenient form. It would have been still more

CHAPTER LXIX.-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 Capitol 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 conquests of Justinian, we have been recalled to the banks of the Tiber, 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 era, 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

acceptable, if a sufficiency of notes had been added, by the appliances of modern learning to elucidate the obscurities and correct the historical and geographical errors which are often found in these pages Such might have been supplied by the able chief of the undertaking, and by some of his colleagues or successors. The newlydiscovered works which are added to the series, do not furnish much important information.-ED.]

(whatsoever may be its influence) was no longer the same;* 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.

In the beginning of the twelfth century,† the era 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 honours, 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 Tiber. At some distance from the city, their approach

* The Abbé Dubos, 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 Poésie et sur la Peinture, part 2, sec. 16.) [The student will have read to little advantage the pages of this History, if he has failed to discover the causes of these changes. Not so much are the faculties of man influenced by the air which he breathes or the institutions which govern him, as by the quietly insinuated impulse of education, Where this is neglected, repressed, or perverted, enslaved mind has no energy. Marshes are left undrained, wastes uncleared, and fields uncultivated; climate deteriorates; the very aspect of nature is darkened, and unresisted tyranny despoils its passive victims. Physical and moral improvement can be effected only by freely active intellect.-Ed.] The reader has been so long absent from Rome, that I would advise him to recollect or review the forty-ninth chapter, in the fifth volume of this history.

The coronation of the German emperors at Rome, more especially in the eleventh century, is best represented from the original monuments by Muratori (Antiquitat. Italiæ medii Ævi, tom. i. dissertat. 2,

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 oath 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!"* 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 were engraved on the papal coins; and their jurisdiction was marked by the sword of justice, which they delivered to the prefect 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,

p. 99, &c.) and Cenni (Monument. Domin. Pontif. tom. ii. diss. 6, p. 261), the latter of whom I only know from the copious extract of Schmidt. (Hist. des Allemands, tom. iii. p. 255–266.)

*Exercitui Romano et Teutonico! The latter was both seen and felt; but the former was no more than magni nominis umbra.

:

Muratori has given the series of the papal coins. (Antiquitat. tom. ii. diss. 27, p. 548-554.) He finds only two more early than the year 800 fifty are still extant from Leo III. to Leo IX. with 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. [Charlemagne accorded to Adrian I. (772-795) the privilege of coining. This pontiff, and his successors, during the next two centuries, issued a series of silver pennies, which have generally the name of the reigning pope on one side, sometimes with a rude portrait, and on the other side Scus. PETRUS. After 975 the only papal coins, now known, are those of Leo IX., 1048-1054. Humphreys, Coin Collector's Manual, p. 514, edit. Bohn. The later