sacrifice rose from the Pantheon, and when camelopards and tigers
bounded in the Flavian amphitheatre. The proudest royal houses
are but of yesterday, when compared with the line of the Supreme
Pontiffs. That line we trace back in an unbroken series, from the
Pope who crowned Napoleon in the nineteenth century to the Pope
who crowned Pepin in the eighth; and far beyond the time of Pepin
the august dynasty extends, till it is lost in the twilight of
fable. The republic of Venice came next in antiquity. But the
republic of Venice was modern when compared with the Papacy; and
the republic of Venice is gone, and the Papacy remains. The
Papacy remains, not in decay, not a mere antique, but full of
life and youthful vigour. The Catholic Church is still sending
forth to the farthest ends of the world missionaries as zealous
as those who landed in Kent with Augustin, and still confronting
hostile kings with the same spirit with which she confronted
Attila. The number of her children is greater than in any former
age. Her acquisitions in the New World have more than compensated
for what she has lost in the Old. Her spiritual ascendency
extends over the vast countries which lie between the plains of
the Missouri and Cape Horn, countries which a century hence, may
not improbably contain a population as large as that which now
inhabits Europe. The members of her communion are certainly not
fewer than a hundred and fifty millions; and it will be difficult
to show that all other Christian sects united amount to a hundred
and twenty millions. Nor do we see any sign which indicates that
the term of her long dominion is approaching. She saw the
commencement of all the governments and of all the ecclesiastical
establishments that now exist in the world; and we feel no
assurance that she is not destined to see the end of them all.
She was great and respected before the Saxon had set foot on