There are in almost every nation certain traditions, which are transmitted from generation to generation, tacitly without any apparent effort by any person to transmit them, which, however, pass to the remotest posterity as if by intuition, and form part of the moral life of a people. Such is in Rome the tradition, more or less correct, of a republic, and of emperors, which is at the bottom of the heart of every inhabitant of the metropolis of the world. Very few people are recorded in history to have fought as we Romans lately did. But I doubt much that we would have so fought even for the same prize—liberty and independence—in the name of prince or king, or any title in Christendom, or, indeed, in any name except that of the republic, and it may be that of an emperor.[363] Joseph, although a Roman Catholic, and anxious to respect the scruples of his mother, Maria Theresa, was a philosopher, meditating already part of those reforms he shortly after effected; and the moment he came within sight of Rome, he decided upon humbling her pride, and putting some restraint upon her immoderate pretensions. When in Rome, as may be imagined, he was courted by all parties, and his support was eagerly sought by every one, and especially by the Zelanti and the Jesuits. Every one waited with impatience to see the part he would take in the contest. But the young prince was, or affected to be, indifferent to the paltry question of the Jesuits, which was then paramount; and in speaking of it, he often repeated that he wondered that the fate of some thousand monks should cause so much uneasiness to such powerful sovereigns. Although he spoke of the Jesuits with the greatest contempt, nevertheless the fathers hoped that they might claim him as their partisan; an opinion which Joseph took care soon to dissipate. While visiting the different monuments of Rome, he went also to the _Gesù_, the principal and most magnificent establishment of the order. The fathers soon gathered round him in the most respectful and humble attitude; and the General, approaching him, and prostrating himself at the emperor’s feet with the most profound humility, was going to address him, when Joseph, without allowing him to go on, abruptly asked him when he was going to relinquish his habit. Ricci turned pale, and muttered some inarticulate words; he confessed that the times were very hard for him and for his brethren, but that they trusted in God and in the future holy Father, whose infallibility would be for ever compromised if he destroyed an order which had received the sanction of so many of his predecessors. The emperor smiled; and being then in the church, and chancing at the moment to fix his regards on a statue of Ignatius of massive silver, and glittering with precious stones, exclaimed against the prodigious sum it must have cost. “Sire,” stammered the Father General, “this statue has been erected with the money of the