? Even the degradation of the
Roman people still commands respect: the mourning of her liberty covers
the world with wonders, and the genius of ideal beauty seeks to console
man for the true and real dignity which he has lost. Behold those
immense baths, open to all those who were willing to taste oriental
voluptuousness--those circuses destined for the elephants which were
brought there to combat with tigers, and those aqueducts which in a
moment converted the amphitheatre into a lake, where galleys too fought
in their turn, and crocodiles appeared where lions were seen
before:--such was the luxury of the Romans when luxury was their pride!
Those obelisks which were brought from Egypt, stolen from African
shades, in order to adorn the Roman sepulchres; that population of
statues which formerly existed in Rome cannot be looked upon in the same
light as the useless pageantry of the Asiatic despots: it is the Roman
genius which conquered the world, and to which the arts have given an
external form. There is something supernatural in this magnificence,
and its poetical splendour makes us forget its origin and its aim."

The eloquence of Corinne excited the admiration of Oswald without
convincing him; he sought for some moral sentiment in all this, without
which all the magic of the arts could not satisfy him. Corinne then
recollected that in this very amphitheatre the persecuted Christians
died victims of their perseverance, and showing Lord Nelville the altars
which are raised in honour of their ashes, as well as the path of the
cross, which is trodden by penitents, at the foot of the most
magnificent wrecks of worldly grandeur, asked him if the ashes of
martyrs conveyed no language to his heart? "Yes," cried he, "I deeply
admire the triumph of the soul and of the will over the pains of death.
A sacrifice, whatever it may be, is nobler and more difficult than all
the flights of the soul and of thought.--An exalted imagination may
produce miracles of genius, but it is only in devoting ourselves to our
opinion or to our sentiments that we are truly virtuous;--it is then
alone that a celestial power subdues the mortal man in us."

This language, so noble and so pure, yet gave uneasiness to Corinne. She
looked at Nelville--then cast down her eyes--and though, at that moment,
he took her hand and pressed it against his heart, she shuddered at the
idea that such a man could sacrifice others or himself to the worship of
opinion