DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.62267#0134
121
CLASSICAL TOUR
Ch. V.
plement of a classical education. Italy is the
theatre of some of the most pleasing- fictions of
the poets, and of many of the most splendid
events recorded by historians. She is the mother
of heroes, of sages, and of saints. She has been the
seat of empire, and is still the nursery of genius,
and still, in spite of plunderers, the repository of
the nobler arts. Her scenery rises far above
rural beauty ; it has a claim to animation and al-
most to genius. Every spot of her surface, every
river, every mountain, and every forest, yes,
every rivulet, hillock, and thicket, have been en-
nobled by the energies of the mind, and are be-
come monuments of intellectual worth and glory*.
No country furnishes a greater number of ideas,
or inspires so many generous and exalting sen-
timents. To have visited it at any period, may
be ranked among the minor blessings of life, and
is one of the means of mental improvement. But
this visit at all times advantageous, was on the
present occasion, of peculiar interest and im-
portance.
Italy seems now to be in the first stage of one
of thoso revolutions that occasionally change the
destinies of nations, and very much improve, or
very much injure the state of society. Tmprove-
* Nullum sine nomine saxum.
Liv. ix.
CLASSICAL TOUR
Ch. V.
plement of a classical education. Italy is the
theatre of some of the most pleasing- fictions of
the poets, and of many of the most splendid
events recorded by historians. She is the mother
of heroes, of sages, and of saints. She has been the
seat of empire, and is still the nursery of genius,
and still, in spite of plunderers, the repository of
the nobler arts. Her scenery rises far above
rural beauty ; it has a claim to animation and al-
most to genius. Every spot of her surface, every
river, every mountain, and every forest, yes,
every rivulet, hillock, and thicket, have been en-
nobled by the energies of the mind, and are be-
come monuments of intellectual worth and glory*.
No country furnishes a greater number of ideas,
or inspires so many generous and exalting sen-
timents. To have visited it at any period, may
be ranked among the minor blessings of life, and
is one of the means of mental improvement. But
this visit at all times advantageous, was on the
present occasion, of peculiar interest and im-
portance.
Italy seems now to be in the first stage of one
of thoso revolutions that occasionally change the
destinies of nations, and very much improve, or
very much injure the state of society. Tmprove-
* Nullum sine nomine saxum.
Liv. ix.