Rome (Classic Reprint)

Excerpt from Rome
Truly Rome is a world: whatever has possessed greatness in the west - art, religion, history - has left its traces in this city. Pagan antiquity, the origin of Christianity and of Byzantine civilisation, the struggles and the transformation of the early middle age, the ecclesiastical supremacy of the thirteenth century, the Renaissance of the fifteenth and sixteenth - all these epochs had Rome for their centre; they covered it with their works, and they live again in it in a crowd of monuments. How many considerable States present us, in comparison with the reminiscences accumulated here, with nothing but fragments without significance In such a collection each author has made his choice; it struck me that one ought, for once at least, to decide to see all and to study all.
Still, even in a special frame, completeness is rare. As day by day and slowly you pursue the pilgrimage of the wonders of Rome, at each step, in the reminiscences of the inhabitants, in the knowledge of the learned men of the country, in forgotten books, and most of all in personal discoveries, you come upon a series of facts which have not been collected before, and you gradually rectify a multitude of erroneous traditions as to the monuments and works of art. In the midst of the masterpieces that fill the churches and palaces, how many undetected gems Among the famous ruins, all through the ancient dwellings of the populous quarters and deserted suburbs, how many remarkable footprints that have hitherto been little remarked Even in the sanctuaries whose very names call to them the attention of all, how many explorations have been left only partly accomplished
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