f

MAN CITY,' meaning Rome, the late capital of the late empire of the Weft, the hiftory of which was terminated in the reduction of the capital, at the close of the third volume; which' city of Rome C acquiefced under the dominion of the popes, about the fame time that Conftantinople was enflaved by the Turkish arms'. The The poor, feeble, and petty pretence, for tacking-on fuch a history to the history preceding, is merely, we fee; that the main point of it is almoft coincident in time, with the concluding point of the other. Never perhaps did digreffion attempt to cover its wantonnefs, with fuch thin and ragged fhreds before. Yet with these does Mr. Gibbon go on, through a cumbrous epilogue of no less than one hundred and twenty-eight pages in quarto. I fhall therefore excufe myself, from reviewing these chapters as I have reviewed the others. I shall only give my usual abstract of each, that my readers may not take my words for this enormous and exorbitant digreffion, but may fee it themselves; and that they may not comprehend it merely in general, but mark it in all its full and affecting detail. The contradictions, the ribaldry, and the mistakes, I fhall pass over entirely. For who can ftop to count the ftars, when a large meteor is streaming before his eyes?

In Chapter the TWELFTH,

or fixty-ninth, we fee the French and German emperours of Rome, 519-520; the turbulence of the Romans towards them, 520-521; the authority of the popes in Rome, 521-523; the turbulence of the Romans towards them also, 523—526; particular inftances of this, 526-528; the general character of the Romans at this period, 528-529; a revolt at Rome, 529-532; the revolters reduced, 532-533; the old republican government revived in part, 533-535; the capitol fortified, 535-536; the coinage of money given to the fenate, 536— 537; the præfect of the city appointed by the fenate and the people, 537-538; the number and choice of the fenate, 538-539; the office of fenator of Rome, 539-540; an account of one, Brancaleone, 540-541; of another, Charles of Anjou, 541—542; of another, Pope Martin IVth, 542; of another, Emperor Lewis of Bavaria, 542; the addrefs of Rome to one of the German emperours, 542-544; another address to another emperour, 544-545; the reply of the latter, 545-546; his march to Rome in favour of the pope, 546; his befieging Rome, and being baffled, 546-547; the wars of the Romans with the neighbouring towns, 547-549; the election of the popes by the fenate and people, 550; by the cardinals alone, 550 -551; the institution of the conclave, 551—552; the people claiming a right to elect, 552-553;

but

but finally giving it up, 553; the absence of the popes from Rome, 553-555; their tranflation of the holy fee to Avignon, 555-557; the institution of the jubilee, 557-560; the nobles or barons of Rome, 560-561; the family of Leo, &c. 561562; of the Colonna, 562-565; and of the Urfini, 565-566. This chapter of near forty pages, is obviously upon the face of the abstract, almoft as abrupt as it is digreffional, and as frivolous as it is devious.

In Chapter the THIRTEENTH

or seventieth, we have an account of Petrarch, 567 -570; his poetic coronation at Rome, 570-571; birth, character, and patriotic defigns of one Rienzi at Rome, 572-574; his affuming the government of Rome, 574-576; his taking the title of tribune, 576; his new regulations, 576-578; the freedom and profperity of Rome under him, 578580; his being refpected in Italy, &c. 580-581; his vices and follies, 581-583; his being knighted and crowned, 583-585; the rifing envy of the people against him, 585; the nobles confpiring against him, 585-586; his feizing, condemning, pardoning, and rewarding them, 586-587; their rifing in arms against him out of the city, 587; attempting to enter it, but beaten off, 588; Rienzi alienating the people more, 588-589; being excommunicated by the pope, and abdicating the government, 590; feuds again at Rome, 590-591;

again a revolt, 591; Rienzi's return to power, 591; his adventures after he had abdicated, 591-593; his being made fenator of Rome, 593; his conduct, 593-594; his being maffacred in a tumult, 594595; Petrarch's inviting and upbraiding the emperour Charles IV. 595-596; his requesting the popes to return to Rome, 596-597; their return, 597; their leaving Rome again, and finally returning to it, 597-599; a pope and anti-pope, 599601; a fchifm, 601; calamities of Rome, 601602; negotiations for union, 603-604; the fchifm inflamed, 604-605; at laft healed, 605-606; the coinage of money refumed by the popes, 606607; the last revolt of Rome, 607; laft coronation of a German emperour at Rome, 608; the government and laws of Rome under the popes, 608610; a confpiracy against the popes, 610-612; but crushed, 612; laft diforders of the nobles of Rome, 612-613; the popes acquiring the abfolute dominion of Rome, 613-615; and the nature of the ecclefiaftical government of Rome, 616618. This chapter of more than fifty pages, is merely a military cheft of the old Romans, a paymafter's hoard of brass farthings. The only parts, that can attract our attention at all, are the internal convulfions of Rome. But Rome is now fo infignificant in itself, and become fo from being lately fo fignificent; that, though its diffenfions are nearly on as large a fcale as thofe, which embroiled its infant flate, yet they are nothing to the mind, in this its fecond infancy. And after all the grand events, that have been brought into the compass of this hiftory,

like the wild beasts into the pit of a Roman amphitheatre; fome from the neighbouring regions, most from the distant and fequeftered parts of the globe, and all to exhibit themselves in heir boldest attitudes before us; the fquabbles of a town in Italy, that had fome ages before been the capital of the world, had then become the capital of the Weft, and was now merely the capital of a district, are little better to the raised conceptions of the reader, than the difputes of the ruffs and the reeves among the birds.

In Chapter the FOURTEENTH

or seventy-first, is a view of Rome from the capitol in the fourteenth century, 620-621; an account of the ruins two hundred years before, 622-623; one of four caufes of their deftruction, 623-626; another, 626-628; another, 628-632; another, 632-635; the Colifeum, 635-637; the games of Rome in it, 637-639; its injuries, 639-640; the ignorance and barbarifin of the Romans, 640643; the restoration and ornaments of the city, 643 -645; and the final conclufion of the work, 645 -646. This chapter of forty-fix pages, is digreffion rioting in its own digreffiveness, digreffion mounting upon the fhoulders of digreffion, and expofing its general abfurdi y the more by its particular excefs. And it ferves with a moft admirable congruity of folly, to put a finishing clofe to this strange digreffion, and to reduce it to a point of ab

furdity,