ST. PETER'S.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XIX, Issue 22, 27 February 1891, Page 20

ST. PETER'S.

(" In a Club Corner," by A. P. Rußsell.) Thb greatest edifice that man hag ever raised was, to Madame de Stael, the most sublime monument in Boms ; and the more so that it at first baffles and disappoints the mind. " One reaches the publime only by degrees. Infinite distances separate it from that which is only beautiful. Bt, Peter's is a work of man which produces on the mind the effect of a marvel of nature. In it the genius of man is glorified by the magnificence of nature." " I have never in my life," •aid Madame de Genlie, "seen but two things which surpassed all that my imagination could picture to me beforehand : these are the ocean and St. Peter's at Borne." " I have been four or five times at St. Peter's," says Hawthorne, " and always with pleasure ; because there is such a delightful, summer-like warmth the moment we pass beneath the heavy padded leather curtains that protect the entrances. It if almost impossible not to believe that this genial temperature i<* the result of furnace heat ; but, really, it ia the warmth of las-t summer, which will be iocluded within these mas9ive walls, and in that vast immensity of space, till, six months hence, this winter's chill will just have made its way thither." The visitor will find that the windows of the church are never opened, it is bo immense as well M bo complete : that it has its own atmosphere, aad needs no supply from the world without ; that the most zealom professor of ventilation would admit that there was no work for him to do here. "When we dream of the climate of heaven, we make it warmth without heat, and coolness without cold, li&e that of St. Peter's." "To see the Pope," exclaimed Northcote, " give tha benediction at St. Peter's !— raising himself up and spreading out his hands in the form of a cross, with an energy and dignity as if he was giving a blessing to the whole world ! "