Page 246 - Third Book of Reading Lessons

READING LESSONS. 245
IMPER'v1ous, a., impenetrable, impassable. L. impervius, not having a passage or way through; im, per, and vie,, a way.
'ms, n., the shield of Minerva, a heathen goddess. L. 9is, so called om aix, G., a goat, because covered with goat-skin.
BANDIT'Tr, n., a gang of outlawed robbers. I. banditti; F. bandit, one declared to be banned, banished, or outlawed :-ban, an interdict,
a curse, and dit, said, p. pt. of dire (L. dicere), to say.
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1. WH T is it, then, which has wrought so sur­ prising a change in the manners and habits of Eu­ rope, of the inhabitants of the great mountain-girdle
of the earth? What is it which has spread cultiva­ tion through wastes deemed, in ancient times, inac­ cessible to improvement, and humanised the manners of a people, remarkable only, under the Roman sway, r the erocity and barbarism of their customs ?
2. What but the in uence of religion; of that ith which has calmed the savage passions of the human mind, and spread its bene cial in uence amongst the remotest habitations of men, and which prompted its disciples to leave the lnxuries and com rts of south­ ern civilisation to di use knowledge and humanity through inhospitable realms,· and spread, even amidst the regions of desolation, the light of knowledge and the blessings of Christianity. Impressed with these ideas, the traveller, in crossing the St. Bernard, and comparing the perfect sa ty with which he now can explore the most solitary parts of these mountains, with the perils of the passage, attested by votive o er­ ings, even in the days of Adrian and the Antonines, will think with thank lness of the religion by which this wonder l change bas been e ected, and with veneration of the saint whose name has, r a thou­ sand years, been a xed to the pass where his in u­
ence rst reclaimed the people from their barbarous li ; and in crossing the de le of :Mount Brenner, where the Abbey of Wilten. rst o ered an asylum 21*