296 ANDREW J. SHIPMAN MEMORIAL 



in the Flavian amphitheatre. The proudest royal houses are 

 but of yesterday as compared with the line of the Supreme 

 Pontiffs. * * * The Catholic Church is still sending forth to 

 the farthermost ends of the world missionaries as zealous as 

 those who landed in Kent with Augustine, and it is still con- 

 fronting hostile kings and governments with the same spirit 

 with which she confronted Attila. The number of her chil- 

 dren is greater than in any former age. Her acquisitions in 

 the new world have more than compensated for what she 

 may have lost in the old. * * * Nor do we see any sign which 

 indicates that the term of her long dominion is approaching. 

 She saw the commencement of all governments and of all the 

 ecclesiastical establishments which 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 in Britain, before the Frank had passed 

 the Rhine, when Grecian eloquence still flourished in Antioch, 

 when idols were still worshipped in the temple of Mecca. And 

 she will still exist in undiminished vigor when some traveller 

 from New Zealand shall, in the midst of a vast solitude, take 

 his stand on a broken arch of London Bridge to sketch the 

 ruins of Saint Paul's." 



