vered with the snows of winter. As I slowly and musingly
pursued my way, my mind went back to the better days of
Milan. Here Ambrose had lived; and how oft, at even-tide,
had his feet traversed this very plain, musing, the while, on
the future prospects of the Church. Ah! little did he think,
that what he believed to be the opening day was but a brief
twilight, dividing the pagan darkness now past from the
papal night then fast descending. But to the Churches of
Lombardy it was longer light than to those of southern
Italy. Ambrose went to the grave; but the spirit of the
man who had closed the Cathedral gates in the face of the
Goths of Justina, and exacted a public repentance of the
Emperor Theodosius, lived after him. From him, doubtless,
the Milanese caught that love of independence in spiritual
matters which long afterwards so honourably distinguished
them. They fought a hard battle with Rome for their reli-
gious freedom, but the battle proved a losing one.
It was
not, however, till towards the twelfth century, when every
other Church in Christendom almost had acknowledged the
claims of Rome, and an Innocent was about to mount the
throne of the Vatican, that the complete subjugation of the
Churches of Lombardy was effected. When the sixteenth
century, like the breath of heaven, opened on the world, the
Reformation began to take root in Lombardy. But, alas! the
ancient spirit of the Milanese revived for but a moment, only
to be crushed by the Inquisition. The arts by which this
terrible tribunal was introduced into the duchy finely illus-
trate the policy of Rome, which knows so well how to tem-
porize without relinquishing her claims. Philip II. proposed
to establish this tribunal in Milan after the Spanish fashion ;
and Pope Pius IV. at first favoured his design. But find-
ing that the Milanese were determined to resist, the pontiff

espoused their cause, and told them, in effec without reason that they dreaded the Spanish was, he said, a harsh, cruel, inexorable Courthe had sanctioned it by a bull)-which condem trial; but he had an Inquisition of his own,

any one any harm, and which his subjects exceedingly fond of. This he would send Milanese were caught in the trap. In the hop of the Spanish Inquisition, they accepted th which proved equally fatal in the end. The Lombardy dates from that day. The Inquisi way for Austrian domination. The familia Office were the avant couriers of the black eag of the house of Hapsburg.

In the arch behind me, so simple withal, and its design, and whose beauty, dependent on n helps or meretricious ornaments, but inherent seen and felt by all, I saw, I thought, a type of while the many-pinnacled and richly-fretted Ca me seemed the representative of the Papacy. arch, in simple but eternal beauty, beside the i of the Duomo, so stands the gospel amid the spu of the world. They, like the Cathedral, are artificial piles. The stones of which they are bu doctrines, burdensome rites, and meaningless cere beautiful contrast to their complexity and incor Gospel presents to the world one simple and grand perplex and weary their votaries, who lose ther the tangled paths and intricate labyrinths with abound. The Gospel, on the other hand, offers straight path to the enquirer, which, once found, lost. These systems grow old, and, having lived

not

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did

vere

The

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one,

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ats

return to the earth, out of which they arose.

The Gospel

never dies, never grows old. Fixed on an immoveable basis, it stands sublimely forth amid the lapse of ages and the decay of systems, charming all minds by its simplicity, and subduing all minds by its power. It says nothing of penances, nothing of pilgrimages, nothing of tradition, nor of works of supererogation, nor of efficacious sacraments dispensed by the hands of an apostolically descended clergy: its one simple and sublime announcement is, that Eternal Life is the Free Gift of God through the Death of his Son.

CHAPTER X.

THE DUOMO OF MILAN.

Interior Disappoints at First Sight-Expands into Mag tion of Interior-Mummy of San Carlo Borromeonization-A Priest at Mass-The Two Mysteries-I Religion and Worship-Roof of Cathedral-Aspect thence-Ascend to the Top of Tower-Objects in the of the World-The Alps from the Cathedral Roof-M -A Future Morning.

My next day was devoted to the Cathedral. great western doorway, a low-browed arch, and statuary, I pushed aside the thick, he closes the entrance of all the Italian churches. neath the roof. My first feeling was one of d so great was the contrast betwixt the airy beauty of the exterior, and the massive and so within. The marble of the floor was sorely foot its original colours of blue and red ha a dingy gray, chequered with the variously-tint flowed in through the stained windows. Th and unadorned pillars looked cold and nak were extending their caps towards you for a

the floor rose a stack of rush-bottomed chairs, as high as a two-storey house,—as if the priests, dreading an eméute, had made preparations by throwing up a barricade. A carpenter, mounted on a tall ladder, was busied, with hammer and nails, suspending hangings of tapestry along the nave, in honour, I presume, of some saint whose fête-day was approaching. The dim light could but feebly illuminate the many-pillared, longaisled building, and gave to the vast edifice something of a cavern look.

But by and by the eye got attempered; and then, like an autumnal haze clearing away from the face of the landscape, and revealing the glories of green meadow, golden field, and wooded mountain, the obscurity that wrapped pillar and aisle gradually brightened up, and the temple around me began to develope into the noblest proportions and the most impressive grandeur. Some hundred and fifty feet over head was suspended the stone roof; and one could not but admire the lightness and elegance of its groined vaultings, and the stately stature of the columns that supported it. Their feet planted on the marble floor, they stood, bearing up with unbowing strength, through the long centuries, the massive, stable, steadfast roof, from which the spirit of tranquillity and calm seemed to breathe upon you. On either hand three rows of colossal pillars ran off, forming a noble perspective of well nigh five hundred feet. They stretched away over transept and chancel, towards the great eastern window, which, like a sun glowing with rosy light, was seen rising behind the high altar, bearing on its ample disc the emblazoned symbols of the Book of the Apocalypse. The aisles were deep and shadowy; and through their forests of columns there broke on the sight glimpses of monumental tombs and altars ranged against the wall. I passed slowly along in front of these beautiful monu