Some Non-Believers on Easter in Rome [pp. 120-126]

i88~.] SOME NoK-BELIE VERS ON EASTER IN RoME. 121
brario' is hidden behind the altar. The cathedral resembles an immense
mausoleum, with the faint gleaming of funereal torches in the distance.
The music of the`Miserere' is not instrumental. It is a sublime choir, admirably combined. Now it comes like the far-off roar of a te~i0pest, as the
vibration of wind upon ruins or among the cypresses of tombs; again like
a lamentation from the depths of the earth or the moaning of heaven's
angels, breaking into sobs and sorrowfully weeping. The marble statues,
gigantic and of dazzling whiteness, are not completely hidden by the darkness, but appear like the spirits of past ages coming out of the sepulchres
and loosing their shrouds to join the intonation of this canticle of despair.
The whole church is agitated and vibrates as if words of horror were rising
from the stones. This profound and sublime lament, this mourning of bitterness, dying away into airy circles, penetrates the heart by the intensity
of its sadness. It is the voice of Rome supplicating Heaven from her load
of ashes, as if under the sackcloth she writhed in her death-agony. To
weep thus, to lament like the prophets of old by the banks of the Euphrates or among the scattered stones of the temple-to grieve in these sublime cadences becomes the city whose eternal sorrow has not marred her
eternal beauty.... Rome, Rome, thou art grand, thou art immortal, even
in thy despair and abandonment. The human heart shall be thy eternal
altar, although the faith which has been thy prestige should perish as the
conquerors who made thy greatness have departed. None can rob thee of
thy God-given immortality, which thy pontiffs have sustained, and which
thy artists will for ever preserve."
The reader must only conjecture how much this passage loses
by translation from the majestic Spanish of which Castelar is
truly the greatest living master.
A very different kind of witness is Mr. Lyman Abbott, an
American writer, who records some interesting impressions of
Easter in Rome.* He says:
"It would be unjust not to advise the reader that it is claimed that all
this effort at splendor and magnificence is purely and wh~lly a tribute of
man to honor the religion which God in his love and mercy has given, and
that no part of it is for man's own honot
"Two circumstances lend confirmation to this view and give to the
ceremonials of the Romish court a peculiar character which distinguishes
them from those of royalty.
"One of these is the honor which the Supreme Pontiff himself pays to
the symbols of the Deity. He yields allegiance to no man; but he publicly and solemnly proclaims his allegiance to a Divine Master. Before the
altar he bows as the commonest peasant in his church must do, and stands
before the Host in reverential attitude and with uncovered head. The same
veneration which he demands for himself as the representative of Christ
he pays to Christ. When he showers his benedictions upon the people or
walks the street in ecclesiastical procession they uncover before him.
Woe to the luckless wight who dares refuse this token of homage to his
sacred person! But when on Holy Week he carries the ~acred emblem,
* dar~er's Magazine for June, 1872.