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82 HASKINS & SELLS November Back to the Land of Matches By JOHN R. WILDMAN THE editor of the BULLETIN has asked me to write an article setting forth some impressions of Europe, gleaned from a recent holiday abroad. As the BULLETIN is in need of filler, I have agreed to try my hand at something of the kind, even at the risk of boring those serious-minded readers who are interested, as a rule, only in technical matters. After the antiquity with which Rome reeks, one is so properly awed and at the same time reminded of the extreme youth of America that anything having to do with praise of the latter country, or comparison with Europe, is likely to smack of presumption. One talks glibly of events " B . C . " and "A. D . , " but the dates have little significance until one sees the physical evidence, in a place like Rome, of things in existence years before Christ was born in Bethlehem. Comparative history takes on a new slant and more life amid the ancient ruins of the "Eternal City." The Pantheon, a circular structure with walls twenty-two feet thick, ascribed to M. Agrippa 27 B. C . , and originally a temple of the pagans who preceded the Christian era, seems to refute the oft-heard statement that all the works of mortal man are on their way to the scrap heap. Two thousand years is a long stretch. But before the Pilgrim Fathers landed at Plymouth; before Columbus discovered America; before the Emperor Con-stantine was converted to Christianity; before Christ came to this terrestrial sphere, even twenty-seven years before, there stood the sacred temple with its dome like the vault of heaven, and the only light within coming from a single aperture at the top, twenty-nine feet in diameter. When it rains, the rain falls on the stone floor of the edifice, which is now a Christian church and the resting place of some of Italy's immortals. It may seem that any attempt to laud and magnify the name of America is out of place, born of ignorance, and, in short, bad taste. It is proverbial of Americans abroad that, like Englishmen, they shout about the merits of their native land. True, these ravings are not always in good taste; they are not always based on sufficient experience for judgment; they are frequently the result of excessive enthusiasm. But are they properly justifiable? What have we for which we may claim antiquity? Where is the building, no matter what its history or association, which has been left standing after the land on which it rested became too valuable to justify its economic existence? How can we boast of age and authority for speaking
Object Description
Title |
Back to the land of matches |
Author |
Wildman, John Raymond, 1878-1938 |
Subject |
Europe -- Description and travel |
Citation |
Haskins & Sells Bulletin, Vol. 06, no. 11 (1923 November), p. 82-85 |
Date-Issued | 1923 |
Source | Originally published by: Haskins & Sells |
Type | Text |
Collection | Deloitte Digital Collection |
Digital Publisher | University of Mississippi Libraries. Accounting Collection |
Date-Digitally Created | 2009 |
Identifier | HS Bulletin 6-p82 |