Had Poggio by his intercourse with Nicolas V. imbibed a portion of the meekness of spirit which influenced the conduct of that amiable patron of literature, he would have provided for his present comfort and for his future fame. But he unfortunately indulged, to the latest period of his life, that bitterness of resentment, and that intemperance of language, which disgraced his strictures on Francesco Filelfo. When he quitted the Roman chancery he did not depart in peace with all his colleagues. At the time of his removal to Florence he was engaged in the violence of literary hostility against the celebrated Lorenzo Valla. In Lorenzo he had to contend with a champion of no inferior fame—a champion whose dexterity in controversy had been increased by frequent exercise. This zealous disputant was the son of a doctor of civil law, and was born at Rome towards the end of the fourteenth century.[422] He was educated in his native city, and when he had attained the age of twenty-four years he offered himself as a candidate for the office of apostolic secretary, which, as he himself asserts, he was prevented from obtaining by the intrigues of Poggio.[423] Quitting Rome in consequence of his disappointment, he repaired to Piacenza for the purpose of receiving an inheritance which had devolved to him on the recent death of his grandfather and his uncle.[424] From Piacenza he removed to Pavia, in the university of which city he for some time read lectures on rhetoric.[425] The history of the transactions in which he was engaged immediately after his removal from Pavia is involved in considerable obscurity. But it is clearly ascertained, that about the year 1435 he was honoured by the patronage of Alfonso, king of Naples, whom he appears to have accompanied in his warlike expeditions. Soon after the translation of the pontifical court from Florence to Rome in the year 1443, Valla returned to his native city. His residence in Rome was not, however, of long continuance. About the time of the dissolution of the council of Florence, he had written a treatise to prove the erroneousness of the commonly received opinion, that the city of Rome had been presented to the sovereign pontiffs by the emperor Constantine.[426] The officious malice of some fiery zealots having apprized Eugenius IV. of the nature and object of this treatise, the wrath of that pontiff was kindled against its author, who, being obliged to fly from the rage of religious bigotry, took refuge in Naples, where he was kindly received by his royal protector.