But along with these, he delivered other discourses which were, to say the least, eccentric; _e.g._, “I know that men wish to find a crime in my speeches, and that out of envy; but, thanks to heaven, three things consume my enemies--luxury, envy, and fire.”[396] These two last words were greatly applauded; I do not understand them, however, especially the last. I believe that they were applauded, precisely because the audience did not understand them, as happens to many street orators, with whom resonant and meaningless words supply the place of ideas, and are even greeted with greater enthusiasm. The fact is, that, among the upper classes, he passed for one of those persons of unsound mind who were then in great request for the amusement of society.[397] The nobles, especially the Colonna, disputed the pleasure of his company with each other, and he would tell them of the glories of his future government. “And when I am king or emperor, I will make war on all of you. I will have such an one hanged, and such another beheaded.” He spared none of them, and mentioned them by name, one by one, to their faces; and, all the time, both to nobles and commons, he continued to speak of the good state, and of how he was going to restore it. Here I insert a parenthesis. It has been said (by Petrarch in particular) that he feigned madness, and was a second Brutus; but when we see his love for pomp, luxury, strange symbols, and garments, gradually increasing as he advanced in his political career, and after his rise to power, we no longer have any doubt as to the reality of his madness. He continued to put forth new symbolical pictures, among others one with this inscription: “_The day of justice is coming--Await this moment_.” Be it noted that this picture represented a dove bringing a crown of myrtle to a little bird. The dove stood for the Holy Spirit (as we shall see, one of the favourite objects of his delirium) and the bird was himself, who was to crown Rome with glory. At last, on the first day of Lent, 1347, he affixed to the door of San Giorgio another placard: “_Before long, the good State of Rome shall be restored_.” Not being feared by the nobles, who thought him mad, he was able to conspire secretly, or rather to keep up the ferment of public opinion, by taking apart, gradually, one by one, the men who seemed to him best adapted for the purpose, and assigning them their posts on Mount Aventine, towards the end of April, on a day when the governor was to be absent.