Rome is, externally, the most moral and decorous of European cities.

In reality, she may be only a whited sepulchre, but at any rate, the whitewash is laid on very thick, and the plaster looks uncommonly like stone.

From various motives, this feature is, I think, but seldom brought prominently forward in descriptions of the Papal city.

Protestant and liberal writers slur over the facts, because, however erroneously, they are deemed inconsistent with the assumed iniquity of the Government and the corruptions of the Papacy.
Catholic narrators know perhaps too much of what goes on behind the scenes to relish calling too close an attention to the apparent proprieties of Rome.

Be the cause what it may, the moral aspect of the Papal city seems to me to be but little dwelt upon, and yet on many accounts it is a very curious one.
As far as Sabbatarianism is concerned, Rome is the Glasgow of Italy.