THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC SOCIETY 



April 5. Home, by Rev. Dr Alkx: Mackay-Smitii, of Washington, 

 I). C. 



The name : its significaiu^e in history. Differentiation from other world- 

 forces. Its position. Tlie people who fonnded it. Environment. Mix- 

 ture of races. The resultant in terms of character. Tlie opportunity of 

 Rome. Clearing the way. The enlargement of power. What tfie sea 

 did for Rome. What Rome did for man. P>olution and involution. Its 

 growth in certain virtues. The vice of those virtues. The virtue of those 

 vices. The wings and claws of tlie eagle. The culmination of glory. The 

 sphere of influence. W^hy the llepuhlic became an Empire, and the Em- 

 pire waned. Roots and fungi.' The Imperial City : its splendor; what 

 it stood for. The upheaval of new forces. Readjustment. The turning 

 over of Europe. Fresh foci. The bar])arian at the gates. IMedijcval 

 Rome. Its influence. Its rationale. Its weakness and power. The re- 

 naissance. Old foes with new faces. Its meaning in Art and Religion. 

 Reverence and contempt. The dust-heaii and ant-hill. The city of today. 

 The " hiding of its power." What it means to the scholar, to the artist, 

 to the traveler. Characteristics. The strength of ruins. The palimpsest 

 of history. 



April 12. Coiislant'uioph', by Prof. Edwin A. Gijosvenor, of Amherst 

 College. 



Rome, though able to build up a universal empire, could no longer re- 

 tain her' place as the world's capital under conditions existent at the end 

 of the third century. A change of site was absolutely necessary. A new 

 world-capital must be planted on some spot possessed of four requisites : 

 the positional, the strategic, the material, and the sentimental. Former 

 emperors had perceived this fact, but the undertaking was beyond their 

 power. The name of Constantine is immortalized and his statesmanship 

 demonstrated in that he took definite and decisive action. Only after 

 years of disappointed examination did he recognize the one preeminent 

 site. " No city chosen by the art of man has been so well chosen and so 

 permanent." The history and influence, the whole being of none other, 

 has been so determined by physical causes, by environment. The spot 

 once selected, the city was the creation of nature rather than the result 

 of imperial decree. In the hands of its environment it was a passive and 

 by means of its environment an active factor. It gave strength to the 

 emjiii'e rather than derived strength from the empire. From 3;>0 to 1204 

 it was the queen-city of the world. During tho.se tumultuous nine cen- 

 turies, while every other continental city was captured more than once, 

 Constantinople did not once succumb to foreign attack. 



The crowned heir of Rome and Italy, it was inevitably the heir of 

 Athens and Greece. Ilellenismos, deserting the Ilyssos and Kei>hi.ssos, 

 found its focal center on the banks of the Uosphorus, and under the name 

 Byzantine was distinctly Greek. 



When the world's front changed, Constantinoi^le lost for a time its un- 

 disputed i)reeminence, but has never descended to a lower rank than that 

 of cai)ital of an empire. During the last centuries its i)olitical imi)ortance, 

 because of its political possibilities, has constantly increased. Today the 



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