TH8 DECLINE AND FALL

3J0

CHAP.

LXX.

males.” Yet those celestial admonitions weresupported by some arguments of temporal po-licy. The residence of Avignon had been invad-ed by hostile violence: at the head of thirtythousand robbers, an hero had extorted ransomand absolution from the vicar of Christ and thesacred college; and the maxim of the Frenchwarriors, to spare the people and plunder thechurch,was a new heresy of the most dangerousimport.” While the pope was driven from Avig-non, he was strenuously invited to Rome . Thesenate and people acknowledged him as theirlawful sovereign, and laid at his feet the keys ofthe gates, the bridges, and the fortresses ; of thequarter at least beyond the Tyber. p But thisloyal offer was accompanied by a declaration,that they could no longer suffer the scandal andcalamity of his absence; and that his obstinacywould finally provoke them to revive and assertthe primitive right of election. The abbot ofmount Cassin had been consulted whether he

* I have not leisure to expatiate oil the legends of St. Bridget orSt. Catherine, the last of which might furnish some amusing stories.Their effect on the miud of Gregory XI. is attested by the last solemawords of the dying pope, who admonished the assistants, ut caverentab hominibus, sive riris, sive mulieribus, sub specie religionis loquen-tibus visiones sui capitis, quia per tales ipse seductus, &c. (Baluz. Not.ad Vit. Pap. Aveuionensium, tom. i, p. 1223).

° This predatory expedition is related by Froissard (Chroniqne,tom. i, p. 230), and in the life of du Gnesclin (Collection Generale desMemoires Historiques, tom. iv, c. 16, p 107-113). As early as theyear 1361, the court of Avignon had been molested by similar free-booters, who afterwards passed the Alps (Memoires sur Petrarque,tom. iii, p. 563 569).

p Fleury alleges, from the annals of Odericus Raynaldus, the origi-nal treaty, which was signed the 21st of December 1376, between Gre-gory XI. and the Romans (Hist. Lcrles. tom. xx, p. 276).