patriotic Italian of the fourteenth century might be pardoned for
looking to a foreign ruler, even to a somewhat commonplace and
unpromising prince, for the initiative in restoring order. The
Italians were too completely engrossed by their own complex interstate
relations, and too thoroughly convinced of the absolute inferiority
of "the barbarians," seriously to apprehend that foreign intervention
might ultimately develop into subjugation. History was, indeed, quite
explicit upon this point. The German emperors had never been able to
establish their control over Italy except partially and for the moment.
Practical considerations were not, however, the most fundamental
justification and explanation of the Ghibelline reliance upon foreign
intervention. The political speculation of the time shows clearly that
theory was much more potent than the obvious necessity of governmental
reform in fostering the imperial cause. The theory in question was
that of the perpetuity of the Holy Roman Empire, with its divinely
recognised centre at Rome. Even at the courts of the despots, whose
practical sagacity was creating the first modern states with their
elaborate systems of administration, Petrarch, like Dante, loved to
brood, with a half-mystical, half-humanistic partiality, upon that
perdurable illusion which exercised such an inexplicable charm over
the mediæval mind. It was the same craving for an ideal union of
humanity under one consecrated head that led Dante joyfully to hail
the coming of Henry VII. In the same great cause,--the defence of
the Empire,--Marsiglio of Padua, by far the keenest of the political
thinkers of Petrarch's time, composed his extraordinary treatise upon
government and the relations of church and state. Longing for the
restoration of Rome's supremacy, Petrarch first placed his hopes in
Rienzo, and then, after the Tribune's fall, sent message after message
to Charles IV., King of Bohemia, the grandson of Dante's imperial hero,
exhorting him to have pity upon Italy and widowed Rome.
Mr. Bryce calls Dante's treatise on government an epitaph, not a
prophecy. Petrarch, too, was blind to the forces about him which made
for political progress. He learned nothing from that race of really
great rulers, the Visconti, with whom he was intimately associated.
Moreover, the most original and profound work upon government which
the Middle Ages produced, the _Defensor Pacis_ of Marsiglio of Padua,
written in 1324, appears to have exercised no influence upon him, and
although he confined his reading to the classics and the writings
of the Fathers, his political sympathies and ideals are typically
mediæval. In his treatment of these matters he does not rise above
the current argumentation of the Imperialists, although he re-enforces
his position with a greater abundance and precision of historical
illustration.
* * * * *
Rienzo had found in Petrarch a sympathetic confidant when, as early as
1343, upon visiting Avignon, he had unfolded his audacious schemes to
him.[7] When, four years later, at Pentecost, 1347, the innkeeper's son
carried out his successful _coup d'état_ and got possession of the city
of Rome, Petrarch was enchanted, as is shown by the letter given below.
The immediate results of Rienzo's accession to power were indeed almost
magical: order was restored, the roads were rendered safe for the first
time in the memory of man, and an Italian parliament was summoned to
consider the unification of Italy. The Tribune's manifestoes aroused
universal enthusiasm; and, in spite of the writer's inflated and
obscure style, Petrarch pronounced him, long after the spell was
broken, a most eloquent and persuasive orator and a graceful writer.
Petrarch seemed to see his own dreams realised; the ancient dignity
and ascendancy of Rome were re-established; the foreign tyrants, as he
called the Roman nobility, including the Colonnesi, had been expelled;
the power was once more in the hands of the divinely elected people
of Rome. Rome was soon to be the head of a unified and rejuvenated
Italy, perhaps of a redeemed Europe. By November Petrarch was on his
way to join Rienzo. He was probably actuated to some extent, however,
by his desire to see Italy once more, and to escape from the reproaches
of his former friends at the papal court, especially of Giovanni
Colonna, whose favour he necessarily sacrificed by his public espousal
of Rienzo's cause. But upon his reaching Genoa, letters forwarded
to him from Avignon brought the sad story of the Tribune's fatal
indiscretions. He thereupon gave up the idea of going to Rome, and
contented himself with addressing a sharp reprimand to the delinquent
ruler, to whom he recalled the truth: _Magnus enim labor est magnæ
custodia famæ_.[8]
After scarcely seven months of power Rienzo ignominiously retired
from the Capitol and fled to the solitudes of the Abruzzi. There,
while living the life of a hermit, he was encouraged by prophetic
revelations to renew his attempts to establish the Roman power. He
determined to conciliate the new Emperor, Charles IV., foreigner as
he was, and win him if possible to his fantastic[9] schemes. This
strangest of all Italian ambassadors must have reached Prague when
Charles was fresh from a perusal of Petrarch's first summons to him,
which is given below.[10] The Emperor listened curiously to Rienzo's
representations, but instead of joining him in a campaign for the
realisation of the ideal Roman Empire he shut up the ex-Tribune as an
enemy of the Church, and later turned him over to the pope at Avignon.
Petrarch still sympathised with the unfortunate captive, and prepared
an appeal to the Roman people in his favour.[11] After a brief return
to a restricted exercise of power as senator under the papal control,
Rienzo was killed by a mob, October 8, 1354.[12]
1: _Sen_., xiv., i. Printed as a separate tractate in the Basle
editions, under the title _De republica optime administranda. Opera_,
pp. 372 _sqq_.
2: _Fam_., ii., 13 (vol. i., p. 133).
3: _Ep. Poet. Lat_., ii., 1.
4: _Fam_., iv., 8 (vol. i., p. 219).
5: _Cf. Sen_., x., 2 (_Opera_, pp. 870-872), where Petrarch describes
the sad change of times since his student days. The mercenary bands
(_grandes compagnies_) who wandered into Italy from France were
doubtless a prime cause of the poet's gloomy views.
6: _Purgatorio_, vi.
7: Petrarch's letter "to a Friend" (_Ep. sine Titulo_, vii.; also
_apud_ Fracassetti, _App. Lit_., No. 2) was doubtless addressed to
Rienzo in 1343, and expresses the enthusiasm which he felt upon first
meeting him.
8: _Fam_., vii., 7.
9: _Fantastic_ is the adjective applied to Rienzo, even by
contemporaries. Giovanni Villani (xii., 90) says that the more
thoughtful judged that "la dita impreso del tribuno era un opera
_fantastica_ e da poco durare." The author of the _Vita di Cola di
Rienzo_ refers to his _fantastic_ smile.
10: See pp. 361 _sqq_. (To Charles IV., Emperor August...)
11: Given below, pp. 348 _sqq_. (To the Roman People, urging...)
12: The chief source for the life of Rienzo is the _Vita di Cola di
Rienzo_ by an unknown author (_apud_ Muratori's _Antiquitates_, and in
a modern edition, Florence, 1854). Gregorovius gives a charming account
of Cola in the sixth volume of his _Geschichte der Stadt Rom._
* * * * *
Petrarch's letters to Rienzo do not simply show an absorbing
interest in the attempt of a national leader to restore the ancient
prestige of Rome and to establish the unity of Italy; they seem
to prove that there was a fundamental congruity, a spiritual
affinity--_Wahlverwandtschaft_[1]--between the two men, which would
have made them firm friends had they been brought together. One,[2]
at least, of the eight letters of Petrarch to Rienzo which have been
preserved is strikingly free from constraint, and would lead us to
believe that the poet, on his part, was anxious that their relations
should be those of cordial familiarity. The letter which follows gives
us some notion of the widespread interest aroused by the Tribune's
first acts.
_To Cola di Rienzo, Tribune of the Roman People._[3]
I shall continue to write to you every day, not from any hope of a
reply,--for, in view of your heavy and varied cares, I must admit that
while I long for an answer I can hardly expect one,--but rather that
you may be the first to learn what goes on in my mind respecting you,
and especially that I may in this way assure you of my deep concern
for your welfare. I clearly perceive, in the first place, that you
are set on a high pinnacle, exposed to the gaze, the judgment, and the
comments not only of the Italians but of the whole human race; not
only of those who are now alive but of those who shall be born in all
the centuries to come. I realise, too, that you have assumed a heavy
but a splendid and honourable responsibility, and undertaken a task at
once glorious and unique. Never will our own generation, never will
posterity, as I believe, cease to think of you. The speech of other men
is as idle and discordant as their fleeting whims, but your purpose, no
whit less firm than the Capitoline rock upon which you dwell, is one
not to be shaken by every breath.
I know not whether you are aware of one thing, or, if so, whether you
have given it any thought. You must not imagine that your letters which
have hitherto reached us have remained in the hands of those to whom
they were addressed. They are promptly copied by everybody with such
eagerness, and circulated about the papal corridors with such interest
that one would suppose that they came from a celestial being, or a
dweller at the antipodes, rather than from one of our own race. At the
rumour of a letter from you the whole populace gathers. Never was an
utterance of the Delphic Apollo interpreted in so many senses as your
words. I cannot but extol your circumspection in maintaining a tone at
once so temperate and so free from offence, and I pray most fervently
that you will henceforth take greater and greater precautions in this
respect. Your words reflect the noble spirit of the writer and the
majesty of the Roman people, without derogating in any way from the
reverence and honour due to the Roman pontiff. It beseems your wisdom
and eloquence to be able so to associate things which appear, but are
not in reality, contradictory, that each is given its due weight.[4]
I have noted how astonished some have been that the conflict in your
letters between modesty and assurance resulted in so equal a contest
and so doubtful a victory, for neither cowardly fear nor swelling pride
showed themselves in the arena. Men hesitate, I observe, whether to
admire most your deeds or your words, since all admit that for your
devotion to liberty they may well declare you a Brutus, and for your
eloquence, a Cicero,--whom Catullus of Verona calls "most fluent."
Continue, then, as you have begun. Write not only as if everyone were
to see your letters, but as if they were to be sent forth from all
our shores, and transmitted to every land. You have laid the firmest
of foundations, in peace, truth, justice, and liberty; build upon
these; for what you raise thereon shall be established, and he who
runs upon them shall be dashed to pieces. He who opposes truth shall
prove himself a liar; he who opposes peace, a turbulent spirit; he who
opposes justice is himself unjust, and he who opposes liberty, arrogant
and shameless.
I approve of your custom of keeping copies of all the letters which
you send to various parts of the globe, for these copies are useful in
determining what you should say by what you have already said, and they
enable you, when it is necessary, to compare the letters of others with
your own. That you do this is proved to me by the manner in which you
dated your letter. Your magnificent subscription, moreover, "in the
first year of the Republic's freedom," smacks of the intent to begin
our annals anew. The expression delights and comforts me. And since you
are wholly engaged in action, and until you discover a genius equal
to the affair, I tender you, unless God ...,[5] my little skill and
this pen of mine, as Livy says, to uphold the memory of the people who
rule the earth; nor will my _Africa_ disdain to give place a little.
Farewell.
1: _Cf_. Voigt, _op. cit_., i., p. 52.
2: _Var_., 47.
3: _Var_., 38. Written in 1347.
4: Rienzo found it impossible in the long run to reconcile his
assumption of power with the prerogatives of Rome's papal sovereign.
5: A word is apparently missing here in the MS.
* * * * *
The following letter, written some five years after Rienzo's _coup
d'état_, is not only important for its references to the ex-Tribune's
reception at Avignon, but it enables us to judge how the whole affair
appeared to Petrarch after his friend's disgrace.
_Rienzo under the Protection of the Muses._
_To Francesco Nelli._[1]
What do you expect me to tell you now?--something more of the episode
in my last letter, which may equally well have brought indignant tears
to your eyes or made you laugh?[2] At this moment I certainly have
nothing more important on hand, although there are plenty of trifling
duties. Indeed, lack of time prevents my turning to more weighty
matters, and even what little time I have is not really free, but is
filled with astonishing interruptions. I am in a constant hubbub,
always in motion, running here, there, and nowhere.[3] This is an ill
that is all too familiar to those who move from place to place. Having
left Babylon[4] for the last time, I am now at the Fountain of the
Sorgue, my usual port of refuge from the storms that overtake me. Here
I am waiting for travelling companions, as well as for late autumn,
or at least for that season when, as Virgil hath it, "the shortening
days bring a waning heat." In the meantime, that my country life may
not be wholly profitless, I am gathering together the results of past
meditation. Every day I try either to make some progress in the more
important writings which I have in hand or to finish outright some one
little thing. This letter will show you what I am doing to-day.
Poetry, a divine gift which belongs of necessity to the few, is now
beginning to be usurped, not to say profaned and degraded, by the
many. To me there is nothing more irritating than this, and if I
know your disposition, my friend, you will find it no less hard than
I to reconcile yourself to this unbecoming state of affairs. Never at
Athens or Rome, never in the times of Homer or Virgil, was there such
an ado about poets as we have now on the banks of the Rhone; although
I believe there was never a place or a time when the knowledge of
these matters was at so low an ebb. But I would have you smother your
irritation in a laugh, and learn to jest even in the midst of sadness.
Cola di Rienzo has recently come, or rather been brought, a prisoner,
to the papal curia. He who was once the Tribune of the city of Rome,
inspiring terror far and wide, is now the most miserable of men, and,
what is worst of all, I fear that, miserable as he undoubtedly is,
he ought scarcely to arouse our pity, since he who might have died
with glory upon the Capitol has submitted to be imprisoned, first by
a Bohemian and then by a native of Limoges,[5] thus bringing derision
upon himself and upon the Roman name and state. How active my pen was
in praising and admonishing this man is perhaps better known than I
should wish. I was enamoured of his virtue; I applauded his design,
and admired his spirit; I congratulated Italy, and anticipated a
restoration of dominion to the mother city, and peace for the whole
world. I could not disguise the joy that such hopes engendered, and
it seemed to me that I should become a participant in all this glory
if I could but urge him on in his course. That he keenly felt the
incentive of my words his letters and messages amply testified. This
aroused me the more, and incited me to discover what would serve to
inflame further his fervid spirit; and, as I well knew that nothing
causes a generous heart to glow like praise and renown, I disseminated
enthusiastic eulogies, which may have seemed exaggerated to some,
but which were in my opinion perfectly justified. I commended his
past actions, and exhorted him to persevere in the future. Some of my
letters to him are still preserved, and I am not altogether ashamed
of them. I am not addicted to prophecy; would that he, too, had
refrained from it! Moreover, at the time when I wrote, what he had done
and what he seemed about to do was worthy not only of my admiration
but of that of the whole human race. I doubt whether these letters
should be destroyed for the single reason that he preferred to live a
coward rather than die with dignity. But it is useless to discuss the
impossible; however anxious I might be to destroy them I cannot, for
they are now in the hands of the public, and so have escaped from my
control.
But to return to our subject. He who had filled evil-doers throughout
the world with trembling apprehension, and the good with glad hope and
anticipation, approached the papal court humbled and despised. He who
had once been attended by the whole Roman people and the chiefs of the
Italian cities was now accompanied by two guards only, one on either
side, as he made his unhappy way through the people, who crowded about
him in their eagerness to see the face of one of whom they had only
heard the proud name....[6] In this plight, as I understand from the
letters of friends, one hope is left him; a rumour has spread among
the people that he is an illustrious poet. It seems to them a shameful
thing that one devoted to so sacred a pursuit should suffer violence.
The elevated sentiment that now prevails with the crowd is the same
to which Cicero once appealed before the magistrates, in favour of
his teacher, Aulus Licinius Archias. But I need not add a description
of the oration, which I formerly fetched from farthest Germany when
travelling through that region as an eager sight-seer in my early days.
During the year following my return, in response to the desires of your
friends, I sent it to our native city. That you have it and have read
it carefully I can see from the letters which reach me from there. But
what shall I say of Rienzo's affair? I am delighted, and rejoice more
than words can tell, that such honour is now rendered to the Muses,
and--what is the more astonishing--by those who are unacquainted with
them; so that they are able to save by their name alone a man otherwise
hateful even to his very judges. What more exalted prerogatives could
they have enjoyed under Augustus Cæsar, at a time when they were held
in supreme honour, when poets came from all parts to look upon the
illustrious countenance of that unique prince who was at once their
friend and the ruler of the earth? What greater tribute, I ask, could
be paid to the power of the Muses than that they should be permitted
to snatch from death's door a man certainly detested,--with how much
reason I will not discuss,--a convicted and confessed criminal (even
if not guilty of the offence of which he is accused), about to be
condemned by the unanimous vote of his judges to capital punishment.
I am delighted, again I say it; I congratulate both him and the
Muses,--him upon the protection he enjoys, them upon the honour in
which they are held. Nor do I grudge an offender, reduced to his last
hope and in such critical circumstances, this saving title of poet.
Yet if you asked my opinion I should say that Cola di Rienzo is very
eloquent, possessed of great powers of persuasion, and ready of speech;
as a writer also he is charming and elegant, his diction, if not very
copious, is graceful and brilliant. I believe, too, that he reads all
the poets that are generally known; but he is not a poet for all that,
any more than one is a weaver who dons a garment made by another's
hands. Even the writing of verses does not suffice by itself to earn
the title of poet. As Horace most truly says,
'T is not enough then merely to inclose
Plain sense in numbers,--which if you transpose,
The words were such as any man might say.[7]
But this man has never composed a single poem which has reached
my ears, nor has he applied himself to such things; and without
application nothing, however easy, can be well done.
I wished to tell you all this in order that you first might be moved
by the fate of one who was once a public benefactor, and then might
rejoice in his unexpected deliverance. You will, like me, be equally
amused and disgusted by the cause of his escape, and will wonder, if
Cola--which God grant!--can, in such imminent peril, find shelter
beneath the ægis of the poet, why Virgil should not escape in the
same way? Yet he would certainly have perished at the hands of the
same judges, because he is held to be not a poet but a magician. But
I will tell you something which will amuse you still more. I myself,
than whom no one has ever been more hostile to divination and magic,
have occasionally been pronounced a magician by quite as acute judges,
on account of my fondness for Virgil. How low indeed have our studies
sunk![8]...
1: _Fam_., xiii., 6. This letter was probably written in 1352.
2: This refers to an account of the refusal to grant Petrarch a papal
secretaryship because of his too elegant Latin. See above, p. 118.
3: The Latin--Nam et ego totus in motu, et multa circumstrepunt,
simulque hic et alibi, atque ita nusquam, sum--forcibly expresses what
is often supposed to be a quite modern experience.
4: _I.e._ Avignon.
5: Namely, by Emperor Charles IV. and Pope Clement VI. _Cf._
Papencordt, _Rienzi_, 254, n. 1.
6: In the portion of the letter here omitted Petrarch laments Rienzo's
inconstancy and want of insight, and dwells upon the fact that he is
accused not of having deserted a noble cause but of having dared to
contemplate a free republic. The same sentiments are expressed in the
letter which follows this.
7: Howes' version of _Sat_., i., 4, 42.
8: The letter closes with a last illustration of the prevailing
ignorance. A highly talented and well-educated man (vir litterarum
multarum et excelsi ingenii) of Avignon gravely asked Petrarch if a
certain person, who could make a public speech and write a letter with
some ease, might not properly be called a _poet_.
* * * * *
The treatment of Rienzo by the papal officials at Avignon seemed to
Petrarch an insult to the Roman people; and he determined, shortly
after the prisoner's arrival, to appeal to those who had once shared
in the Tribune's fleeting glory. Petrarch's interest in the case may
very well be ascribed, in part at least, to his former friendship for
Rienzo; his letter is, however, chiefly important as illustrating his
political ideas and his highly fantastic conception of the Roman Empire.
_To the Roman People, urging them to Intervene in Rienzo's Trial._[1]
Invincible people, to whom I belong, Conquerors of the Nations! there
is a grave question which I would discuss with you, briefly and in
confidence. I pray you therefore, I conjure you, illustrious men, to
grant me your attention, for yours are the interests at stake. It is
a serious matter, a most serious matter, with which none other in the
world can be compared. But lest I should exhaust your interest by
delay, or seem to endeavour to give added weight to a matter that by
its very nature is of supreme importance, I will omit any introduction
and come at once to the point.
Your former Tribune is now a captive in the power of strangers,
and--sad spectacle indeed!--like a nocturnal thief or a traitor to his
country, he pleads his cause in chains. He is refused the opportunity
of a legitimate defence by the highest of earthly tribunals. The
magistrates of justice themselves reject the claims of justice,
and deny him what has never been denied to even the most impious
offenders.[2] It is true that he may perhaps deserve to suffer in this
manner, for, after he had planted the Republic by his skill, with his
own hands so to speak, after it had taken root and flowered, in the
very bloom of glorious success he left it. But Rome assuredly does not
merit such treatment. Her citizens, who were formerly inviolable by law
and exempt from punishment, are now indiscriminately maltreated, as
anyone's savage caprice may dictate, and this is done not only without
the guilt that attaches to a crime, but even with the high praise of
virtue.