St. Paul daily globe., 1893-06-11
Rev. DR.. Conway Writes in
Readable Style Of Italy's
Capital.
Pope Leo XIII. as Viewed by
a Friendly, but Critical
EeclesiaStic.
A Wonderful Old Man, in
Whom Spirituality Is
PerSonified.
Americans Made to Feel at
Home by Countrymen in
the Eternal City.

Rome is made the subject of DR.. Con-
ways article today, and it is handled in
manner calculated to please and inter
est all readers of the GLOBE:
London and Paris are but parvenus
compared with Rome Partisan polite
ness teaches the polished restraint of
the science of life. London's lavish
gold is lesson i'll the power of money,
but Rome teaches the history of the
world. The city of the popes and the
Caesars recalls at once the two great
powers in this world, the spiritual and
the temporal, the church and the state,
each supreme within its own sphere. l
cannot agree with Frederick Harrison
that the light of poetry has left Rome
forever. How can the light of poetry
have left city whose every house has
history, ever ruin a romance, every
castle an artistic past joined with the
active, almost seething, present?
The light of poetry can
not have left city where :even yet
there are chevalierS full of the en-
thusiasm of Peter the Hermit and the
chivalry of William the COnqueror. Sur
rounded by group of such men one
is instinctively brought back to the days
of the crusades and feels as though
he were about to set out on
an expedition to save Europe from
the Turks or to rescue the sacred
sepulchre from the ruthless hands Of
the Saracens.
Rome is a resume of all human his
tory. The perfection of pagan Rome
may be read in the richness of its ruins.
They are mute yet eloquent reminder
that of the very ancient glories the
papacy alone remains. And Macaulay's
words. written in 1910, have their full
force in 1898: 1.-The papacY remains not
in decay, not a mere antique, but full of
life and vigor." If you turn from pagan
to Christian Rome you can read in it
the history OF Christianity from its cruel
cradle in the catacOmbs to its palatial
lieVers unbend in their devotion to-
wards the Christian aspect of the city
on the Tiber. Frederick Harrison, the
famous London positvist, having reviS-
ited Rome recently, says:
''We are truly in touch with scenes
historically conSecrated by some of the
greatest souls who have ever dignified
humanity. with spots haliowed as some
of the turning points in human civiIsa-
tion, and certainly consecrated by the
tears and prayers of believers during
eighteen centuries. We neither sur
render our critical Judgment, nor give
way to a ribal Skepticism. What parts
of this mighty and pathetic pageantry
of Christian legend are real, and what
parts are pouS fiction or unholy fraud,
we cannot tell. Let US forbear to probe
further where the task is vain. Bot
this we know: That in that enormous
mass of legend, relic, ceremonial, ira
dition and art, there is basis of pro-
found reality, and world of imagery,
emotion, sacrifice, such as mans brain
and heart have never surpassed"
And ii SCme Christian legend be rot.
quite true; if the story of the thornless
rose of Assysi be a myth; if no sacred
fountains ever sprang where Saul'S
severed head is said to have thrice
jumped; if there be not satisfying his
torical evidence that the Sancta Casa
was not carried by angels from Nazareth,
the despiSed, to the lone widows farm
at LOrettO what of it? Is there not un-
derlying it all spirit of veneration and
love and reverence that a cultured
world cannot afford to despise and
should not affect to ignore? And if
intense nationaliSm has caused what
artists aid arch8ologiStS might look
upon as deSecration, there are those who
think that progressive action is called
for by the times spirit, land that sedate