THE ROMAN EMPIRE.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume V, Issue 251, 22 February 1878, Page 9

THE ROMAN EMPIRE.

Nothing conveys a loftier conception of the grandeur, might, wealth and civilization of the Roman Empire at its most flourishing period than the remains of its principal towns, and especially of its colonial cities. It is not the public edifices of Rome herself, unequalled as they are for vastness and magnificence, which impress us most with' her former power. They are such monuments as we might expect from those who peopled the capital of the world. But it is the third or fourth class towns, such as Pompeii, with its two theatres, its amphitheatre, its temples, its basilica, and its fomm, all upon a scale of singular splendour, adorned with hundreds of statues in bronze and marble with exquisite paintings, and with the most precious marbles ; it is the distant colonial cities of Palmyra, Philadelphia, Gerasa and others whose names are almost unknown to history, with their long avenues of graceful columns, their shrines of marble, carved with an unrivalled luxury and richness of detail, their stupendous granaries of hewn stone, and their vast edifices directed to political and religious purposes, or to. public amusements, now rising in solitary grandeur amidst the wastes of the Syrian desert, that fill our minds with wonder and enable us to form some conception of the greatness and power of that mighty people. Of these great colonial cities but the principal bones have been preserved to us. We must restore them to the mind's eye as the geologist does the primeval, monster from a few scattered remains found in the hardened rock. Fortunately, however, Pompeii furnishes us, to a certain extent, with the means of doing so. There we have more than the mere skeleton ; we have such traces of the flesh and muscles as will enable us to build up the living form, and to obtain some insight into the manners, habits and daily life of that great Roman people. And there is still much to be done and much to be discovered. , But one-third of the town has yet been exposed to view. Twenty years must elapse, if the works are carried on as they now are, before the whole is uncovered. It is true that the most important edifices and consequently, the more wealthy quarters of the town have been explored ; but there still remains a vast number of private dwellings, ' which are, in many respects, even more interesting than the public buildings, because not found elsewhere, and likely, under the skilful direction of Signor Fiorelli, to furnish us with new and most reliable particulars relating to the domestic life of the Romans. We are thus indebted to Vesuvius for the preservation of the most perfect monument of the ancient world. The terrible mountain, while it destroyed, saved Pompeii ; and when the shroud of lava-mud and ashes shall have been altogether raised from it, the traveller will gaze upon the most perfect form of a Roman city. — London Quarterly.