THE CONFERENCE. 49 



baths, how advantageous is the sea for our daily traffic^ 

 without whidi we could not now subsist ! How does it not 

 only furnish us with food and physic for the bodies, but 

 with such observations for the mind as ingenious persons 

 would not want ! 



How ignorant had we been of the beauty of Florence, of 

 the monuments, urns, and rarities that yet remain in and 

 near unto old and new Rome, so many as it is said will 

 take up a year's time to view, and afford to each of them 

 but a convenient consideration ! And therefore it is not to 

 be wondered at, that so learned and devout a father as St. 

 Jerome, after his wish to have seen Christ in the flesh, and 

 to have heard St. Paul preach, makes his third wish, to 

 have seen Rome in her glory ; and that glory is not yet all 

 lost, for what pleasure is it to see the monuments of Livy, 

 the choicest of the historians ; of Tully, the best of orators ; 

 and to see the bay-trees that now grow out of the very 

 tomb of Virgil ! These, to any that love learning, must be 

 pleasing. But what pleasure is it to a devout Christian to 

 see there the humble house in which St. Paul was content 

 to dwell, and to view the many rich statues that are made 

 in honour of his memory! nay, to see the very place in 

 which St. Peter and he lie buried together ! These are in 

 and near to Rome. And how much more doth it please 

 the pious curiosity of a Christian to see that place on which 

 the blessed Saviour of the world was pleased to humble 

 Himself, and to take our nature upon Him, and to converse 

 with men : to see Mount Sion, Jerusalem, and the very 

 sepulchre of our Lord Jesus ! How may it beget and 

 heighten the zeal of a Christian to see the devotions that 

 are daily paid to Him at that place! Gentlemen, lest I 



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