OF THE HOMAN EMFIKE.

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cuate the city on the day of his coronation; and chap.his shameful retreat was pursued by the re- 1XX-proaches of the patriot bard. k

After the loss of liberty and empire, his thirdand more humble wish was to reconcile the shep- °^ vi | | no . nherd with his flock; to recal the Roman bishop residenceto his ancient and peculiar diocese. In the fer- atRome 'vour of youth, with the authority of age, Pe-trarch addressed his exhortations to five succes-sive popes, and his eloquence was always in-spired by the enthusiasm of sentiment and thefreedom of language. 1 The son of a citizen ofFlorence invariably preferred the country of hisbirth to that of his education; and Italy , in hiseyes, was the queen and garden of the world.

Amidst her domestic factions, she was doubtlesssuperior to France both in art and science, inwealth and politeness; but the difference couldscarcely support the epithet of barbarous, whichhe promiscuously bestows on the countries be-yond the Alps. Avignon , the mystic Babylon,the sink of vice and corruption, was the objectof his hatred and contempt; but he forgets thather scandalous vices were not the growth of thesoil, and that in every residence they would ad-

* The hopes and the disappointment of Petrarch are agreeably de-scribed in his own words by the French biographer (Memoires, tom.iii, p. 375-413); but the deep, though secret wound, was the corona-tion of Zanubi the poet-laureat by Charles IV .

1 See in his accurate and amusing biographer, the application of Pe-trarch and Rome to Benedict XII. in the year 1334 (Memoires, tom i,p. 261-265); to Clement VI. in 1342 (tom. ii, p. 45-47); and to UrbauV. in 1366 (tom. iii, p. 677-691); his praise (p. 711 715), and excuse(p. 772), of the last of these pontiffs. His angry controversy on therespective merits of France and Italy may be found Opp. p. 1068-1085 .