These abuses were less felt whilst the Pontificate drew
riches from abroad, which in some measure counterbalanced the evils of
their remiss and jobbish government at home. But now it can subsist
only on the resources of domestic management; and abuses in that
management of course will be more intimately and more severely felt.
In the midst of the apparently torpid languor of the Ecclesiastical
State, those who have had opportunity of a near observation have seen a
little rippling in that smooth water, which indicates something alive
under it. There is in the Ecclesiastical State a personage who seems
capable of acting (but with more force and steadiness) the part of the
tribune Rienzi. The people, once inflamed, will not be destitute of a
leader. They have such an one already in the Cardinal or Archbishop
Boncompagni. He is, of all men, if I am not ill-informed, the most
turbulent, seditious, intriguing, bold, and desperate. He is not at all
made for a Roman of the present day. I think he lately held the first
office of their state, that of Great Chamberlain, which is equivalent to
High Treasurer.
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