LXX. the castle of St Angelo a faithful garrison, and a CHAP. train of artillery. Their batteries incessantly thundered on the city, and a bullet more dextrously 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 Last coroalarmed by the approach of Frederic the Third of nation of Austria; though his fears could not be justified by Emperor, the character or the power of the Imperial candidate. After drawing his military force to the metropolis, and imposing the best security of oaths* and treaties, Nicholas *The oath of fidelity imposed on the Emperor by the Pope, is recorded and sanctified in the Clementines, (1. 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 German Federic A. D. March 18. 1452, LXX. CHAP. 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 honour 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. The statutes and government of Rome. 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 *. According to the laws of Romet, 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 * 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.). See, in the statutes of Rome, the senator and three judges® (1. i. c. 3—14.), the conservators (1. i. c. 15—17. l. iii. c. 4.), the caporioni (1. i. c. 18. 1. iii. c. 8.), the secret council (1. iii. c. 2.), the common council (1. 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. LXX. recalled to the same office till after the expiration CHAP. of two years. A liberal salary of three thousand florins was assigned for his expence 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 colour or livery of the city. His oath in the Capitol proclaims his right and duty to observe and assert the laws, to controul 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 entrusted 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 LXX. CHAP. was composed of the magistrates and their imme diate 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, methodised in three books, and adapted to present use, under the pontificate, and with the ap probation, of Gregory the Thirteenth. This civil and criminal code is the modern law of the city; and, * Statuta alma Urbis Rome Au&oritate S. D. N. Gregorii XIII. Pont. Max. a Senatu Populoque Rom. reformata et edita. Roma, 1580, in folio. The obsolete, repugnant statutes of antiquity were confounded in five books, and Lucas Pætus, a lawyer antiquarian LXX. and, if the popular assemblies have been abolished, CHAP. a foreign senator, with the three conservators, still resides in the palace of the Capitol *. 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 spiritual mo narch. of Porcaro, A. D. 1453, It is an obvious truth, that the times must be Conspiracy suited to extraordinary characters, and that the genius of Cromwell or Retz might now expire in Jan. 9 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 enlightend 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, antiquarian, was appointed to act as the modern Tribonian. Yet I regret the old code, with the rugged crust of freedom and barbarism. In my time (1765), and in M. Grosley's (Observations sur l'Italie, tom. 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, |