The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1895-02-23

and more of favor in scientific circles;
and now comes a witness from the
very front rank of the radicals among
literary men.
That we do not overestimate the
position of Carducci, we would again
quote the testimony of M. Monfecor-
boil who says: "Giosue Cdrducci,
as thinker and poet, has place so
high in the world that it is we'll to
take notice of all that he writes, and
of all that he says" And again he
speaks of him as the ''impassioned
poet, the bold and profound thinker,
the man of every liberty, nay of every
audacity: the one who called to him
tie youth and led them in the way of
advance"
1t is indeed refreshing to find such
expressions as are contained in the
words of such a man. They differ
greatly, both in tone and spirit, from
the ebullitions of his youth. The
role assumed by the author of "Sat-
ana, Fat San Marino, certainly seems to
show that new earnestness, like un
to that which has found expression
among recent French writer's, has al
ready made healthy growth on the
Italian peninsula; and that new
force must be reckoned with, among
those which are molding popular
opinion among the Latin races. But
without further introduction let him
speak himself. We give few ex
tracts from the address,.
"Dear Citizens: l earnestly desire
that this day to which we are now
come, this day on which we inaugurate
this new palace of the republic, should
be to our sons and our descendants a
propitious and glorious day, as it is in
deed happy and sacred one for US.
s.At this time when the peoples and
by tempest of IDEAS, of events and of
hopes; at this time when sinister sub
terranean disturbance seems to menace
the very foundations of civilization, we
are united here. setting apart, offering,
almost consecrating this palace. with the
fifteen centuries OF memories which sur
round it. to the hopes OF the future. We
greet from here all that we regard in the
past, the rudiments and the origins of
our race With the proud submits OF its
history. Beneath our eyes we see Ra-
VIENNA, the Etruscan; Rimini, the Gau-
lish; Ancona, the Doric; but if Rimini
with it's bridge thrown across there by
Augustus; if Ancona with its arch of
Trajap; if Ravenna with the urns of the
sons of Theodosia invite us and we speak
proudly of the grandeur and the misfor
tunes of the Roman empire, our venera-
tion. otherwise greatly moved. goes out
to seek the altar of the new life of Italy
at the tomb of Dante.
"Out of all these elements, the germs
of this famous history waited onwards
by the changing winds Of good or evil
torture, must needs be- born on these
heights a fower-the flower of our Lib
erty. When the Roman empire sunk
down to decay God designed that by a
swift cooperation of the genius of the
race, nature and all the special condi-
tions of the time favoring it, God de-
signed, repeat, that the poor wretches
of the Latin race should re-commence
here that which is the spirit and the
primordial form of the government of the
italian people.
Il have said God, oh citizens, for
under good republic, it is still lawful
not to be ashamed of God; on the con-
trary, it is to him that it ought first of
all to address itself and from whom it
ought to seek again the omens, as our
ancestors of the communes we're accus
toned to do. and before them our fore
fathers, our forefathers of Rome. the
powerful, and of Greece the beautiful.
THE hate, an old hate against tyran-
nical and pestilential superstition, to-
gether with a new pride of the over
confident observers of the victories of
external truth. have detached and alien
ated the Latin from the Divine idea;
but neither the villainy of priests, nor
the arrogance of philosophers, is able to