Had the cardinal of Santa Croce been rendered illustrious by no other circumstance, his patronage of Tommaso da Sarzana, who under the appellation of Nicolas V. became one of the brightest ornaments of the pontificate, would have been in itself sufficient to secure to him the praises of posterity. Tommaso was the son of Bartolomeo dei Parentucelli, a professor of arts and of medicine in the city of Pisa. His mother Andreola was a native of Sarzana. He had scarcely attained to the age of seven years, when he experienced an irreparable misfortune in the death of his father. In consequence of this event Andreola removed from Pisa to Sarzana, where she soon consoled herself for the loss of Bartolomeo, in the arms of a second husband. This new connexion was rendered unhappy by the illiberality of her spouse, who looked upon his step-son with a jealous eye, and embittered the days of the unoffending youth, by the harshness of his behaviour towards him. This unfortunate circumstance rendered Andreola very anxious concerning the future destination of her son, which, however, she flattered herself was at length fixed by supernatural interposition.—When Tommaso was about ten years of age he was seized by the plague, by which dreadful malady he was soon reduced to the last extremity. Exhausted with fatigue, occasioned by her unremitting attendance upon her favourite child, Andreola sunk into a disturbed slumber, during the continuance of which an angel seemed to appear before her, and to promise that the object of her care should recover from his disease, if she would promise to dedicate to the priesthood the life which, for this high purpose alone, the mercy of God would vouchsafe to spare. Waking from her dream, Andreola made a solemn vow that she would fulfil the direction of the heavenly messenger—and her child recovered. In pursuance of her sacred engagement, when Tommaso had attained the age of twelve years, she sent him to commence his studies at Bologna. The rigid moroseness of her husband, however, would not permit her to furnish the youthful student with any means of supporting himself. At this feeble age, therefore, the future pontiff was banished from an uncomfortable home, and sent forth into the wide world, with no resources but his genius, his virtues, and the generosity of the benevolent. These apparently inauspicious circumstances called into exertion an energy of mind which cannot be too highly applauded. For the space of six years Tommaso applied himself to his studies with astonishing diligence, and soon made considerable progress in various departments of knowledge. When he had attained his eighteenth year, his literary reputation induced two eminent citizens of Florence to invite him to undertake the education of their children. This invitation Tommaso readily accepted; and from his eighteenth to his twenty-second year, he was engaged in the laborious employment of initiating his pupils in the rudiments of learning.