Page:Life in the Old World - Vol. II.djvu/117

Rh Apostles of war, and the people are no more dragged along in rude triumphal procession.

Here rise, in solemn mournful beauty, the broken columns of the Forum, ruins of the place, where, for the first time, the rights of the people found unflinching supporters and protectors through the force of language and public opinion. Long may those columns remain, in their ruinous beauty! This forum is needed no longer. It shows the way. But the all-subjecting power of the new time is supported by spiritual columns which can neither be broken nor yet fall. Christianity and the free press have made this impossible. And upon the concentrated forum of humanity—thank Heaven!—even the captive speaks, even silent sighs are heard!

Modern Rome has been built upon the site of ancient Rome and in great measure out of its ruins. Upon the spot where stood the golden house of Nero, the palaces of Claudius, and Caracalla, the temples of the heathen divinities, now rise Christian churches and temples, where art ministers to the highest ideas. The symbol of the cross is reared upon the Capitol, as well as on the spires of the temple of Minerva. Catholic Rome arose out of the pile of the heathen, imperial Rome, and became a ruler even as she had been. And that on the plea of eternal right. The Catholic Church was then the Christian Church, great in power and in wisdom; she possessed the keys of the kingdom of heaven: Christ's revelation and its doctrines. Thus she became, during the minority and the half-savage condition of the world, the educator who led the people to the Saviour, to order, and to unity. She