ot
unsparingly shewn them; but we must judge men, not according as they
approach perfection, but according as their good or bad qualities
preponderate--their talents or their weaknesses--the benefits they
effected, the evil they wrought. For a man who rose to so great a power,
Rienzi's faults were singularly few--crimes he committed none. He is
almost the only man who ever rose from the rank of a citizen to a power
equal to that of monarchs without a single act of violence or treachery.
When in power, he was vain, ostentatious, and imprudent,--always an
enthusiast--often a fanatic; but his very faults had greatness of soul,
and his very fanaticism at once supported his enthusiastic daring, and
proved his earnest honesty. It is evident that no heinous charge could
be brought against him even by his enemies, for all the accusations to
which he was subjected, when excommunicated, exiled, fallen, were for
two offences which Petrarch rightly deemed the proofs of his virtue
and his glory: first, for declaring Rome to be free; secondly, for
pretending that the Romans had a right of choice in the election of
the Roman Emperor. (The charge of heresy was dropped.) Stern, just, and
inflexible, as he was when Tribune, his fault was never that of wanton
cruelty. The accusation against him, made by the gentle Petrarch,
indeed, was that he was not determined enough--that he did not
consummate the revolution by exterminating the patrician tyrants. When
Senator, he was, without sufficient ground, accused of avarice in
the otherwise just and necessary execution of Montreal. (Gibbon, in
mentioning the execution of Montreal, omits to state that Montreal was
more than suspected of conspiracy and treason to restore the Colonna.
Matthew Villani records it as a common belief that such truly was the
offence of the Provencal. The biographer of Rienzi gives additional
evidence of the fact. Gibbon's knowledge of this time was superficial.
As one instance of this, he strangely enough represents Montreal as the
head of the first Free Company that desolated Italy: he took that error
from the Pere du Cerceau.) It was natural enough that his enemies and
the vulgar should suppose that he executed a creditor to get rid of a
debt; but it was inexcusable in later, and wiser, and fairer writers
to repeat so grave a calumny, without at least adding the obvious
suggestion, that the avarice of Rienzi could have been much better
gratified by sparing than by dest