I have sought to make present to them the utter dreariness, the hopeless discontent, the abject demoralization, which strike a resident in Rome, unless he refuses wilfully to see the truth.

In the dead Rome of real life; in the universal spiritless immorality of Roman society; in the decay of what once was the Roman people; in the squalid misery of the country towns, miserable even in their merriment; in the utter isolation of the Papal States, a moral lazaretto amongst European kingdoms, you see only too plainly the permanent condition of the country.

As to the present misery, you can read its signs in those pageants which impose on no one; in the Carnivals, where there are no revellers; in the solemn ceremonies, where the worshippers are sought in vain; and in the sad, sullen, hopeless demonstrations, whereby a people protest constantly that they are weary of their fate.

If you look for causes, you may find them perhaps in those trials without law or justice; in that Press without liberty or truth; in those Church-sanctioned lotteries; in the presence of that multitude of priests, and in the policy which dictated the outrage of St Joseph's day, and the Bull of excommunication.

How far these causes are sufficient to explain the fact, is a matter of opinion.
I can understand a fervent believer in the Catholic Faith saying, that the people of the Papal States ought to be happy and prosperous under Papal rule.