Memories of Rome

Introductory Remarks—Advantages of Travel-Interest attaching to certain localities-No City more famous than Rome Rome compared with Jerusalem-Quotation from Rogers - The Wonders of Rome-Its Associations-Interesting Monuments instanced-The Arts in Rome-Religion in Rome-The Capital of Christendom— Piety and Decorum of the Romans-Examples-The interest of Rome felt by Travellers of every religious denomination-Other interesting localities compared with Rome-Superior interest of the Eternal City.

STRANGE things are those old thoughts that so often knock for entrance to the heart!-those memories that crowd around us with their precious store of relics gathered and saved as we pass along upon the road of life! That sweet, faint remembrance of the past, with what a spell it sways us! Thought follows thought; each brings something with it—a pearl upcast from waves that are now dim and distant-a flower from fields that have long since been troddenand many, many 'sweet pictures of the loved olden times;-some, gay scenes, and fringed with light and gold; others, sad, and bound in darkness and ebony,all loved and treasured by the heart. We first think of these things we dream of them-and then the rest is feeling-deep, silent! From this we sometimes wake

to weep; but while it lasts how sweet it is! And this is not confined wholly to persons of a rich imagination; the poorest and the lowliest one has its bits of sunshine-its ancient bliss and sorrow, its old rude pictures of events and places. The peasant loves "the house where he was born;" he thinks with affection of the hills around it, which are radiant for ever with the brightness of his youth, and the river, whose familiar voice had once chimed into every sound of his lamentation and his joy. That summer lane is for ever beatified and canonized in his mind with the flood of a great happiness; and those dim, silent places are ever dark to him with the shadows of distress and death that once were on them. But meanly stocked, indeed, is the memory of the poor, illiterate, untravelled peasant, compared with the stately well-furnished recollection of him who has culled his treasures with care and taste amongst the brightest countries in the world. A thousand visions move his heart, which are not dreamt of by the natives who have never been expatriated from their home-soil. For it is not alone by the associations connected with our own existence that we are moved; scarcely less are we interested in localities. sacred to the heroes of our race,-storied ground, peopled with names and persons famous in the world's annals, the home of influences that have swayed the human kind, the repositories of the sublimest works of human genius. It is natural for us to seek these spots with eagerness,— -we feel ourselves brought nearer to the great spirits which seem ever to linger amongst them in the glory with which they are invested.

Memory loves to dwell on them, and the mind is refined and exalted by the ideas which they suggest. It is of one of the most remarkable of these that I now propose to gather some recollections. I do not intend to write a history or a guide-book, but I will merely sketch a few of the thousand pictures of the Eternal City, on which I love to dwell in thought, and sometimes add what information my memory affords me at the moment.

Considered in almost what light you will, there is no city in the world more famous, more wonderful, than this city of Rome. Jerusalem has a greater attraction, in one point of view; but many of the most important relics which once made Jerusalem the universal centre of pilgrimage are now to be seen in Rome; and in any other way the Syrian village cannot bear a moment's comparison with "the mistress of the world." Rome,

"As though

Grandeur attracted grandeur, are beheld

All things that strike, ennoble; from the depths
Of Egypt, from the classic fields of Greece-
Her groves her temples-all things that inspire
Wonder, delight! Who would not say the forms
Most perfect, most divine, had by consent
Flock'd thither to abide eternally

Within those silent chambers where they dwell,
In happy intercourse?"

In Rome is crowded together all that is most interesting and most glorious to behold; the most valuable museums and the richest libraries, the finest pictures and the noblest statues, the most graceful fountains

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