Rome

"Si fueris Romæ, Romano vivito more; Si fueris alibi, vivito sicut ibi."

"When I am at Rome I fast as the Romans do; when I am at Milan I do not fast. So likewise you, whatever church you come to, observe the custom of the place, if you would neither give offence to others, nor take offence from them."

"Despise this union of discordant races! To defend oneself by alliance is proof of cowardice."

"I found Rome a city of bricks and left it a city of marble."

"When I am at Rome, I fast on a Saturday: when I am at Milan I do not. Do the same. Follow the custom of the church where you are."

"When in Rome do as the Romans"

"Now conquering Rome doth conquered Rome inter, And she the vanquished is, and vanquisher. To show us where she stood there rests alone Tiber; and that too hastens to be gone. Learn, hence what fortune can. Towns glide away; And rivers, which are still in motion, stay."

"Looking back on Rome's success, it is all too easy to conclude that its victories were preordained. It is almost as if Rome arose with consummate certainty from the seven hills, gaining such a height that seemingly it could not be challenged. But in almost every phase of Rome's history there were crises."

"Every one soon or late comes round by Rome."

"When they are at Rome, they do there as they see done."

"O Rome! my country! city of the soul!"

"When falls the Coliseum, Rome shall fall; And when Rome falls—the World."

"You cheer my heart, who build as if Rome would be eternal."

"Cuando á Roma fueres, haz como vieres."

"Y á Roma por todo."

"Quod tantis Romana manus contexuit annis Proditor unus iners angusto tempore vertit."

"Leave for a while thy costly country seat; And, to be great indeed, forget The nauseous pleasures of the great: Make haste and come: Come, and forsake thy cloying store; Thy turret that surveys, from high, The smoke, and wealth, and noise of Rome; And all the busy pageantry That wise men scorn, and fools adore: Come, give thy soul a loose, and taste the pleasures of the poor."

"A great civilization is not conquered from without until it has destroyed itself within. The essential causes of Rome's decline lay in her people, her morals, her class struggle, her failing trade, her bureaucratic despotism, her stifling taxes, her consuming wars."

"The traveler who has contemplated the ruins of ancient Rome may conceive some imperfect idea of the sentiments which they must have inspired when they reared their heads in the splendor of unsullied beauty."

"Yes, I have finally arrived to this Capital of the World! I now see all the dreams of my youth coming to life... Only in Rome is it possible to understand Rome."

"It was scarcely possible that the eyes of contemporaries should discover in the public felicity the latent causes of decay and corruption. This long peace, and the uniform government of the Romans, introduced a slow and secret poison into the vitals of the empire. The minds of men were gradually reduced to the same level, the fire of genius was extinguished, and even the military spirit evaporated. The natives of Europe were brave and robust. Spain, Gaul, Britain, and Illyricum, supplied the legions with excellent soldiers, and constituted the real strength of the monarchy. Their personal valour remained, but they no longer possessed that public courage which is nourished by the love of independence, the sense of national honour, the presence of danger, and the habit of command. They received laws and governors from the will of their sovereign, and trusted for their defence to a mercenary army. The posterity of their boldest leaders was contented with the rank of citizens and subjects. The most aspiring spirits resorted to the court or standard of the emperors; and the deserted provinces, deprived of political strength or union, insensibly sunk into the languid indifference of private life."

"Veuve d'un peuple-roi, mais reine encore du monde."

"Rome was ruined more by neglect of agriculture, and giving no attention to useful trade and commerce, than by the invasion of barbarians."

"Rome, Rome, thou art no more As thou hast been! On thy seven hills of yore Thou sat'st a queen."

"Omitte mirari beatæ Fumum et opes strepitumque Romæ."

"Never before has any city in the world had so a wonderful adventure. Its history is so big that even the huge crimes it is littered with look tiny. Maybe one of the troubles of Italy is exactly this: to have a capital city that is disproportionate, for name and past history, to the modesty of a people that, when shouting "go for it, Rome!", is only referring to a football team."

"The woman you saw is the great city that rules over the kings of the earth. ... Come out of her, my people, so that you will not share in her sins, so that you will not receive any of her plagues; for her sins are piled up to heaven, and God has remembered her crimes. ... In her heart she boasts, ‘I sit enthroned as queen. I am not a widow; I will never mourn.’"

"In tears I tossed my coin from Trevi's edge. A coin unsordid as a bond of love— And, with the instinct of the homing dove, I gave to Rome my rendezvous and pledge. And when imperious Death Has quenched my flame of breath, Oh, let me join the faithful shades that throng that fount above."

"Tous chemins vont à Rome; ainsi nos concurrents Crurent, pouvoir choisir des sentiers différents."

"What's Rome to me, what business have I there?"

"A thousand roads lead men forever to Rome."

"Rome, old lady of the world, in the name of our glorious dead who gave their life to make wonderful days possible, we salute you!"

"Exaudi, regina tui pulcherrima mundi, inter sidereos Roma recepta polos, exaudi, genetrix hominum genetrixque deorum, non procul a caelo per tua templa sumus."

"... The , lost after province, fell into complete ruin. Yet, as it wasted and vanished, the Church, enthroned in the ancient city, waxed stronger and more stately, century and century extending her spiritual conquests. So Rome remained the universal and eternal power, a lighthouse whose steady and inextinguishable rays had from the beginning of time, so men thought, shone into the dark corners of the earth and were destined to shine on, as men hoped, until the ."

"Rome was not built in a day."

"See the wild Waste of all-devouring years! How Rome her own sad Sepulchre appears, With nodding arches, broken temples spread! The very Tombs now vanish'd like their dead!"

"Septem urbs alta jugis, toti quæ præsidet orbi."

"In any case, an alternative to summit meetings was emerging. For centuries it had been customary to send envoys on specific, short-term missions. But by the mid–fifteenth century the tightly knit but feuding city states of northern Italy—Venice, Florence, Milan and Rome—kept permanent ambassadors in key cities in order to gather intelligence and foster alliances. In due course their governments created chanceries to manage the mounting mass of paper. From 1490 the great powers of Europe followed suit, led by Spain. It became normal to have at each of the major courts a resident “ambassador”—a word defined by the English poet and diplomat Sir Henry Wotton in a punning epigram as “a man sent to lie abroad for his country’s good.” Given the time required for travel, and the hazards en route—especially in an age of dynastic and religious warfare—permanent ambassadors offered a convenient substitute for personal summitry. And their detailed reports required the attention of specialist secretaries who oversaw foreign affairs, such as Francis Walsingham in Elizabethan London or Antonio Perez at the court of Philip III. Day-to-day diplomacy tended to slip out of the hands of rulers."

"I am in Rome! Oft as the morning ray Visits these eyes, waking at once I cry, Whence this excess of joy? What has befallen me? And from within a thrilling voice replies, Thou art in Rome! A thousand busy thoughts Rush on my mind, a thousand images; And I spring up as girt to run a race!"

"I had rather be a dog, and bay the moon, Than such a Roman."

"New Rome will be destroyed by the attacks of new vandals."

"Utinam populus Romanus unam cervicem haberet!"

"Luciano often gets asked whether he's Italian when traveling overseas with the team and someone hears his accent."No," he will reply. "We are from Rome!""

"The story of Romulus and Remus being suckled by a wolf is not a meaningless fable. The founders of every State which has risen to eminence have drawn their nourishment and vigor from a similar wild source. It was because the children of the Empire were not suckled by the wolf that they were conquered and displaced by the children of the Northern forests who were."

"From the dome of St. Peter's one can see every notable object in Rome... He can see a panorama that is varied, extensive, beautiful to the eye, and more illustrious in history than any other in Europe."

"The teacher reminded us that Rome's liberties were not auctioned off in a day, but were bought slowly, gradually, furtively, little by little; first with a little corn and oil for the exceedingly poor and wretched, later with corn and oil for voters who were not quite so poor, later still with corn and oil for pretty much every man that had a vote to sell—exactly our own history over again."

"Rome wasn't all built in a day."

"Sit Romana potens Itala virtute propago"

"One of the worst deaths in history."

"History books are full of grim examples of torture, punishment, and execution. Even the Romans, who are often heralded for their supposed civility, were well-versed in cruel and inhumane ways to end another person’s life, from crucifixion to the notorious bronze screaming bull. But of these methods, one has gained an especially feared reputation over the centuries: poena cullei."

"Poena Cullei is the most cruel and unusual punishment ever dreamt up. The “punishment of the sack” makes crucifixion sound like a walk in the park."

"The penalty of parricide, as prescribed by our ancestors, is that the culprit shall be beaten with rods stained with his blood, and then shall be sewed up in a sack with a dog, a rooster, a snake, and a monkey, and the bag cast into the depth of the sea, that is to say, if the sea is near at hand; otherwise, he shall be thrown to wild beasts, according to the constitution of the Deified Hadrian."

"Some historians suspect the punishment wasn’t actually carried out in reality. After all, getting a dog and an ape into the same sack would not be an easy task. Many argue it was only used as a threat designed as a deterrent to terrify anyone who even thought of killing their parents. Others believe it involved tying the accused up in a leather sack but perhaps didn’t involve the addition of other beasts."

"Many historians have thought that the practicalities of sewing up a dog, a monkey, a rooster, a snake, and a human in a sack together indicates that the penalty was never actually enforced – for one thing, it would be as much a punishment for the executioners as it would for the condemned."

"History books are full of grim examples of torture, punishment, and execution. Even the Romans, who are often heralded for their supposed civility, were well-versed in cruel and inhumane ways to end another person’s life, from crucifixion to the notorious bronze screaming bull."

"The complexity and the elaboration of Mithraic iconography surpassed anything that had been done with the medium before. He was the last and finest gasp of a religious system based on vision, on epiphany, on things seen rather than unseen."

"This was one of the last great religious projects not to bring with it sacred texts."