I am now come to Rome, and Rome, they say, is every man's country; she is called _Communis Patria_, for every one that is within the compass of the Latin Church finds himself here, as it were, at home, and in his mother's house, in regard of interest in religion, which is the cause that for one native there be five strangers that sojourn in this city; and without any distinction or mark of strangeness, they come to preferments and offices, both in church and state, according to merit, which is more valued and sought after here than anywhere. But whereas I expected to have found Rome elevated upon seven hills, I meet her rather spreading upon a flat, having humbled herself, since she was made a Christian, and descended from those hills to Campus Martius; with Trastevere and the suburbs of Saint Peter, she hath yet in compass about fourteen miles, which is far short of that vast circuit she had in Claudius his time; for Vopiscus[67] writes she was then of fifty miles' circumference, and she had five hundred thousand free citizens in a famous cense that was made, which, allowing but six to every family in women, children, and servants, came to three millions of souls; but she is now a wilderness in comparison of that number. The pope is grown to be a great temporal prince of late years, for the state of the church extends above three hundred miles in length, and two hundred miles in breadth; it contains Ferrara, Bologna, Romagnia, the Marquisate of Ancona, Umbria, Sabina, Perugia, with a part of Tuscany, the patrimony, Rome herself, and Latium. In these there are above fifty bishoprics; the pope hath also the duchy of Spoleto, and the exarchate of Ravenna; he hath the town of Benevento in the kingdom of Naples, and the country of Venissa, called Avignon, in France. He hath title also good enough to Naples itself; but, rather than offend his champion, the king of Spain, he is contented with a white mule, and purse of pistoles about the neck, which he receives every year for a heriot or homage, or what you will call it; he pretends also to be Lord-paramount of Sicily, Urbia, Parma, and Masseran; of Norway, Ireland, and England, since King John did prostrate our crown at Pandulfo his legate's feet.[68] The state of the apostolic see here in Italy lieth 'twixt two seas, the Adriatic and the Tyrrhene, and it runs through the midst of Italy, which makes the pope powerful to do good or harm, and more capable than any other to be an umpire or an enemy. His authority being mixed 'twixt temporal and spiritual, disperseth itself into so many members, that a young man may grow old here before he can well understand the form of government.