Pilgrimage from the Alps to the Tiber : $b or, The influence of Romanism on trade, justice, and knowledgeWylie, J. A. (James Aitken)
History
Pilgrimage from the Alps to the Tiber : $b or, The influence of Romanism on trade, justice, and knowledge
Wylie, J. A. (James Aitken)
Catholic Church -- Italy; Italy -- Description and travel
And what becomes of the families of these unhappy men? This is the most
painful part of the business. Their livelihood is gone; and nothing
remains but to go out into the street and beg,--to beg, alas! from
beggars. It is not unfrequent in Rome to find families in competence
this week, and literally soliciting alms the next. You may see matrons
deeply veiled, that they may not be known by their acquaintances,
hanging on at the doors of hotels, in the hope of receiving the charity
of English travellers. Shame on the tyranny that has reduced the Roman
matrons to this! Nor is even this the worst. Deprived of their
protectors, moral ruin sometimes comes in the wake of the physical
privations and sufferings by which these families are overtaken. Thus
the misery of Rome is widening every day. Ah! could I bring before my
readers the picture of that doomed city;--could I show them Rome as it
sits cowering beneath the shadow of this terrible tyranny;--could I make
them see the cloud that day and night hangs above it;--could I paint the
sorrow that darkens every face; the suspicion and fear that sadden the
Roman's every word and look;--could I tell the number of the broken
hearts and the desolate hearths which these old walls enclose;--ah,
there is not one among my readers who would not give me his tears as
plenteously as ever the clouds of heaven gave their rain. And he who
styles himself God's Vicar sees all this misery! Sees it, do I say! he
is the author of it. It is to uphold his miserable throne that these
prisons are filled, and that these widows and orphans cry in the
streets. And yet he tells us that his reign is a model of Christ's
reign. 'Tis a fearful blasphemy. When did Christ build dungeons, or
gather _sbirri_ about him, or send men to the galleys and the scaffold?
Is that the account which we have of his ministry? No; it is very
different. "The Lord hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the
meek; he hath sent me to bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty
to the captive, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound." A
few months ago, when the Pope proclaimed his newest invented dogma,--the
Immaculate Conception,--he gave, in honour of the occasion, a grand
jubilee to the Roman Catholic world. We all know what a jubilee is.
There is a vast treasury above, filled with the merits of Pio Nono and
of such as he, out of which those who have not enough for their own
salvation may supplement their deficiencies. At the Pope's girdle hangs
the key of this treasury; and when he chooses to open it, straightway
down there comes a shower of celestial blessings. Well, the Pope told
his children throughout the world that he meant to unlock this treasury;
and bade his children be ready to receive with open arms and open
hearts, this vast beneficence of his. Ah! Pio Nono, this is not the
jubilee we wish. Draw your bolts; break the fetters of your thirty
thousand captives; open your dungeons, and give back the fathers, the
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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