CHAPTER III.
THE PATRIMONY OF THE TEMPORAL POWER.
The Papal States have no natural limits: they are carved out on the map as the chance of passing events has made them, and as the good-nature of Europe has left them.

An imaginary line separates them from Tuscany and Modena.

The most southerly point enters into the kingdom of Naples; the province of Benevento is enclosed within the states of King Ferdinand, as formerly was the Comtat-Venaissin within the French territory.

The Pope, in his turn, shuts in that Ghetto of democracy, the republic of San Marino.
I never cast my eyes over this poor map of Italy, capriciously rent into unequal fragments, without one consoling reflection.
Nature, which has done everything for the Italians, has taken care to surround their country with magnificent barriers.

The Alps and the sea protect it on all sides, isolate it, bind it together as a distinct body, and seem to design it for an individual existence.