Its

ST. PETER'S

BUT lo! the dome,-the vast and wondrous dome,
To which Diana's marvel was a cell,-

Christ's mighty shrine above his martyr's tomb!
I have beheld the Ephesian's miracle,—
Its columns strew the wilderness, and dwell
The hyena and the jackal in their shade;
I have beheld Sophia's bright roofs swell
Their glittering mass i' the sun, and have sur-
veyed

sanctuary the while the usurping Moslem
prayed.

But thou, of temples old, or altars new,
Standest alone, with nothing like to thee,—
Worthiest of God, the holy and the true.
Since Zion's desolation, when that he
Forsook his former city, what could be
Of earthly structures, in his honour piled,
Of a sublimer aspect? Majesty,

Power, glory, strength, and beauty, all are

aisled

In this eternal ark of worship undefiled.

Enter: its grandeur overwhelms thee not;
And why? It is not lessened; but thy mind,
Expanded by the genius of the spot,

Has grown colossal, and can only find
A fit abode wherein appear enshrined
Thy hopes of immortality; and thou
Shalt one day, if found worthy, so defined,
See thy God face to face, as thou dost now
His holy of holies, nor be blasted by his brow.

Thou movest, but increasing with the advance, Like climbing some great Alp, which still doth rise,

Deceived by its gigantic elegance;

Vastness which grows, but grows to harmonise, All musical in its immensities;

Rich marble, richer painting, shrines where flame

The lamps of gold, and haughty dome which

vies

In air with earth's chief structures, though their

frame

Sits on the firm-set ground, and this the clouds must claim.

Thou seest not all; but piecemeal thou must break,

To separate contemplation, the great whole;
And as the ocean many bays will make,
That ask the eye, so here condense thy soul
To more immediate objects, and control
Thy thoughts until thy mind hath got by heart

Its eloquent proportions, and unroll

In mighty graduations, part by part,

The glory which at once upon thee did not dart.

Not by its fault, but thine. Our outward sense
Is but of gradual grasp, and as it is

That what we have of feeling most intense
Outstrips our faint expression, even so this
Outshining and o'erwhelming edifice

Fools our fond gaze, and, greatest of the great,
Defies at first our nature's littleness,

Till, growing with its growth, we thus dilate Our spirits to the size of that they contemplate. LORD BYRON.

THE ILLUMINATIONS OF ST. PETER'S

I

FIRST ILLUMINATION

TEMPLE! where Time has wed Eternity,
How beautiful thou art beyond compare,
Now emptied of thy massive majesty,
And made so faery-frail, so faery-fair:
The lineaments that thou art wont to wear
Augustly traced in ponderous masonry,
Lie faint as in a woof of filmy air,
Within their frames of mellow jewelry.

But yet how sweet the hardly waking sense,

That when the strength of hours has quenched

those gems,

Disparted all those soft-bright diadems,

Still in the sun thy form will rise supreme
In its own solid, clear magnificence,-
Divinest substance then, as now divinest dream

II

SECOND ILLUMINATION

My heart was resting with a peaceful gaze,
So peaceful that it seemed I well could die
Entranced before such beauty, when a cry
Burst from me, and I sunk in dumb amaze:
The molten stars before a withering blaze
Paled to annihilation, and my eye,

Stunned by the splendour, saw against the sky
Nothing but light,—sheer light,—and light's own

haze.

At last that giddying sight took form, and then
Appeared the stable vision of a crown,

From the black vault by unseen power let down,
Cross-topped, thrice girt with flame:

Cities of men,

Queens of the earth! bow low, was ever brow
Of mortal birth adorned as Rome is now?

LORD HOUGHTON.

ST. JOHN LATERAN

OF TEMPLES built by mortal hands,
Give honour to the Lateran first;
"T was here the hope of many lands,-
The infant Church-was nursed;

And grew unto a great estate,

And waxed strong in grace and power, With Christ for head and faithful mate, And learning for her dower.

Since first this house to him was raised,

Three times five hundred years have run;

For this let Constantine be praised,

An English mother's son!

He with his own imperial sword

Did dig foundations broad and deep, That henceforth in his hand the Lord Rome and her hills should keep.

In after ages, one by one,

Arose the altars vowed to Heaven; Each crest is sacred now, but none

Like this of all the Seven!

Behold she stands! The Mother Church!
A queen among her countless peers!
Ah! open be that sacred porch

For thrice five hundred years!

BESSIE RAYNER PARKES.