The Jeffersonian Democrat. [volume] (Chardon, Ohio) 1854-1865, 1861-04-12
Ruins Of Baalbec.

hulus VI ba2lOec.
There is feeling Of melancholy, saws
a traveller, in looking the last look on
such place, sensible that one will never
see il more. The ripping stream seemed
10 mock me as passed over it:
"Men may come aud men NAV 90.
Bnt flow on forever"
And then, in the ghoslly stiffness Of
the night, l entered the vast Trililhou.
The Temple oi Jupiter, under the decep.
tive lightning oi the moon,. looked per-
feet. 1t seemed as il just finished by the
architect, and to morrow Antonius Pom
tifex Maximus might himself be eoming
10 conseerate it 10 mighty Jove. The
religion OF The Roman has been celebra-
ted there. Sacrifices TO the gods Of Baal-
bee were offered there for near four hun
dred years after. the Christian era. Then
another religion occupied its halls and
shrines. The Christian possessed it,
The Cross was erected where the beard
less statue OF Jupiter had stood. The
Bishop Of Heliopolis sat in the Council of
Antioch.
20 Three centuries heard the hymns Of the
Church chsnted in its temples; and the
lay pl ocession Of the priests swept through
its ht xrgon and quadrangle. Then war
was in the land. The DISCRIMINATING con-
quests OF the Crescent, with Tie Of
blood, flowed from the ocean board to
the deserts of Damascus, and qucnched
the lamps that had burned everlaslingly
before the aliars of the City of the Sun.
Darkness covered it for three hundred
years, and silence blotled out the name
OF Heliopolis from history When it once
more emerges. its classic title has perished
in the food Of devastation. Men called
it Baalbec, and the Arabian historian and
Benjamin ofTolcdo "a. D. 1867 noted
it, and tells us OF lis "stones OF enor.
nous size," and how earthquakes have
shaken The land OF Syria, thrown down
its structures, and crushed 10 death its
people.
Saladin next occupied the stage of time.
King Baldwin and Count Raymond car.
ried fire and sword through the LAID.
cried havoc and let slip the dogs Of wal
under its batllements /; for. no longer the
home Of religion, it had been converted
into fortress, and the historian said, il
"is castle built with very large stones. "
And then another tragic actor lretted bis
little day before the world. He bade It's
citizens surrender, and Tamerlane, flush.
ed with victory, marched onward to Da.
mascus. Another century and a hall
rolled over. and we hear no more OF il
until the modern spirit of travel first ex-
hibited itself, and the long catalogue o.
names commenced with the Frenchman
Belar, l548 the English Maundrell,
l697) which links it at last with the peo-
pie Of our own times.
The heather, the Christian, Saracen,
the Turk. all have been its lords and mas.
tiers. What train of ghostly forms my
fancy pictured, with slow aud stately
march, going past me, sweeping over the
floor and through the columned aisles
where once in life they trod Pompey,
the veterans OF Augustus legions the
Emperors OF Rome-Antonius, the bloody
Caracalia, the Christian Theodosius the
actor-the poor actor Gelasinus learning
The hard Thought food OF the sock and
buskin, and yet with the religion OF Chris
in his heart, going with him on the stage
and hallowing his martyr death the i'm
petuous crusader; the conqlering and
courtly Saladin; the fiery Tamerlane-
all, all seemed 10 pass before me, their
wan hands pointing TO the ruins they had
left; and the moon, shining through the
broken inches, the dismantled archilraves
and pillars of Trilthou, reft of all the
sculptor's clothing, exposed them with fu-
neral light before me in giant forms, the
denuded corpse of imperia! pride, the
skeletons of earthly pageantry and power,
mouldering away in the fallow Of centu'
ries.