ROME, 19th Sept.
I have been employed for the last two days in visiting some of the
churches, _palazzi_ and villas of modern Rome; but the number is so
prodigious and there are such a variety of things to be seen in each that I
shall only make mention of a few; indeed there are many that I have not
seen and probably shall not have time to see. As sacred things should
precede profane, let us begin with the churches.
The first that claims the attention of the traveller after St Peter's, is
the church of St John Lateran which is the oldest church in Christendom,
and was the metropolitan of Rome and of the Christian world before the
building of St Peter's. It lies very nearly in a right line with the
_Piazza di Spagna_, and on a prolonged line, forming an obtuse angle with
the church of Santa Maria Maggiore, which, as I first visited, I shall
first describe and afterwards resume what I have to remark on the subject
of St John Lateran.
Santa Maria Maggiore is the third church in importance, but the second in
magnificence in Rome. Before its facade stands a single column of granite
of the Corinthian order. The facade of this church is beautiful but it
would be far better without the _campanile_, which I think always
disfigures a church of Grecian architecture; besides it is not in the
centre of the building.
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