The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Edward Gibbon [2281]
[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 Historiae Romanae ab 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 i: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, Caesar, 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