OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE.

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his pity and esteem; and Petrarch believes that chap.he respected in the hero the name and sacred LXX-character of a poet/ Rienzi was indulged withan easy confinement and the use of books; andin the assiduous study of Livy , and the bible, hesought the cause and the consolation of his mis-fortunes.

The succeeding pontificate of Innocent the Rienzi *e-sixth opened a new prospect of his deliverance Rome ,and restoration; and the court of Avignon was A ' D li54-persuaded, that the successful rebel could aloneappease and reform the anarchy of the metropo-lis. After a solemn profession of fidelity, theRoman tribune was sent into Italy , with thetitle of senator; but the death of Baroncelli ap-peared to supersede the use of his mission; andthe legate, cardinal Albornoz, 8 a consummatestatesman, allowed him with reluctance, andwithout aid, to undertake the perilous experi-ment. His first reception was equal to hiswishes: the day of his entrance was a public fes-tival; and his eloquence and authority revivedthe laws of the good estate. But this momen-tary sunshine was soon clouded by his own

f The astonishment, the envy almost, of Petrarch is a proof, if notof the truth of this incredible fact, at least of his own veracity. Theabb£ de Sade (Memoires, tom. iii, p. 242) quotes the sixth epistle ofthe thirteenth book of Petrarch , but it is of the royal MS. which heconsulted, and not of the ordinary Basil edition (p. 920).

* ALgidius, or Giles Albornoz, a noble Spaniard, archbishop of To-ledo, and cardinal legate in Italy (a. d. 1353-1367), restored, by hisarms and counsels, the temporal dominion of the popes. His life baabeen separately written by Sepulveda; but Dryden could not reason-ably suppose, that his name, or that of Wolsey , had reached the ear*of the Mufti in Don Sebastian.

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