[Transcriber's notes:]
This work is derived from files on the Internet Archive:
http://archive.org/details/symbolismofchurc00dura
Page numbers in this book are indicated by numbers enclosed in curly
braces, e.g. {99}. They have been located where page breaks occurred
in the original book.
The honorific "Mr" is without a following period in the original.
The period has been inserted in this transcription.
[End Transcriber's notes.]
THE SYMBOLISM
OF
_Churches and Church Ornaments_
A TRANSLATION OF THE FIRST BOOK OF THE
_Rationale Divinorum Officiorum_
WRITTEN BY
WILLIAM DURANDUS
SOMETIME BISHOP OF MENDE
_WITH AN INTRODUCTORY ESSAY AND NOTES_
BY
THE REV. JOHN MASON NEALE, B.A.
AND
THE REV. BENJAMIN WEBB, B.A.
OF TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE
_New York_
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
743 AND 745 BROADWAY
1893
DEDICATED TO
THE CAMBRIDGE CAMDEN SOCIETY
BY
TWO OF ITS FOUNDERS
{vii}
PREFACE
The interest which has lately been displayed, as on all subjects
connected with Ecclesiology, so more especially on the symbolical
bearing of Church Architecture, has led us to imagine that a
translation of the most valuable work on Symbolism which the middle
ages can furnish, might not, at the present time, be unacceptable to
churchmen.
Written, however, at a period when Christian Architecture had not
attained its full glory, it necessarily leaves untouched many
arrangements of similar tendency, subsequently adopted; addressed to
those who had not yet learnt to doubt everything not formally proved,
it assumes many points which may now seem to require confirmation: and
composed for the use of a clergy habituated to a most figurative
ritual, it passes over much as well known, which is now forgotten or
neglected. On these accounts we have considered it necessary to prefix
an Essay on the subject; in which we have endeavoured to prove that
Catholic Architecture must necessarily be symbolical; to answer the
more common objections to the system; and to elucidate it by reference
to actual examples, and notices of the figurative arrangements of our
own churches. We have also added notes, where any obscurity seemed
{viii} to require explanation; and we have, both in them and in the
Appendix, thrown together such passages from Martene, Beleth, S.
Isidore of Seville, Hugo de S. Victore, and other writers, as tended
to explain and to enforce the remarks of Durandus.
With reference to the author himself, but little is known; and that
little has been told before.
William Durandus was born at Puy-moisson, in Provence, about the year
1220. A legend of his native country is told in the present work.
[Footnote 1] He became the pupil of Henry de Luza, afterwards Cardinal
of Ostia; and taught canon law at Modena. On this subject he composed
a most learned work, the _Speculum Juris_; from which he obtained the
title of _Speculator_: as also another treatise called _Repertorium
Juris_: and a _Breviarium Glossarum in Textum Juris Canonici_. His
high attainments marked him [Footnote 2] out for the office of
Chaplain to Pope Clement IV.
[Footnote 1: See p. 126]
[Footnote 2: _Mutata fortuna_, says Doard: to what this refers, we
know not.]
He was afterwards Auditor of the Sacred Palace; and Legate to Pope
Gregory X at the Council of Lyons. He was then made Captain of the
Papal forces; in which post he assisted at the reduction of several
rebellious cities, and behaved with great courage. He finally became
Bishop of Mende in 1286. While in this post, and resident at Rome (for
he did not personally visit his diocese till 1291, the administration
of the diocese being perhaps left to a nephew of the same name, who
succeeded him), he finished the work, of the first book of which a
translation is presented to the reader. But it probably {ix} was
commenced before; for we find from a passage in its latter half, that
so far had been written during the course of this same year 1286. And
there is no difficulty in the title, _Episcopus Miniatensis_, which he
gives himself in the Proeme, as this could easily have been added
afterwards. But it was certainly published, as Martene observes,
before 1295; because Durandus speaks of the Feasts of the Holy
Apostles as _semi-doubles_, whereas in that year, by a constitution of
Pope Urban, they were commanded to be observed as doubles. The time at
which the treatise was written more especially demands our attention;
because, did we imagine it only a few years later than it really was,
we might well be astonished at finding no reference to the Symbolism
of the Decorated Style. The interruptions amidst which the _Rationale_
was written are feelingly alluded to by its author, in the Epilogue
(p. 161). He also wrote a treatise _De Modo Concilii Generalis
habendi,_ probably either suggested by, or preparatory to, that of
Lyons. He afterwards went on an embassy from the Pope to the Sultan;
and is by some said to have ended this life at Nicosia in Cyprus. But
the fact is not so: for having governed his diocese ten years, and
having refused the proffered Archbishopric of Ravenna, he departed at
Rome on the Feast of All Saints, 1296, being buried in the Church of
Sancta Maria super Minervam, where his monument is yet to be seen,
with the following inscription:--
{x}
Hic jacet egregius doctor proesul Mimatensis,
Nomine Duranti Guillelmus regula morum:
Splendor honestatis et casti candor amoris
Altum consiliis spatiosum mente serenum
Hunc insignibat immotum turbine mentis.
Mente pius, sermone gravis, gressuque modestus,
Extitit infestus super hostes more leonis:
Indomitos domuit populos, ferroque rebelles,
Impulit, Ecclesiae victor servire coëgit.
Comprobat officiis, paruit Romania sceptro
Belligeri comitis Martini tempore quarti:
Edidit in Jure librum, quo jus reperitur:
Et Speculum Juris, et patrum Pontificale:
Et Rationale Divinorum patefecit:
Instruxit clerum scriptis, monuitque statutis:
Gregorii deni, Nicolai scita perenni
Glossa diffudit populis, sensusque profundos:
Jure dedit mentes et corpus luce studentum:
Quem memori laude genuit Provincia dignum:
Et dedit a Podio Missone diaecesis ilium:
Inde Biterrensis, praesignis curia Papae:
Dum foret ecclesiae Mimatensis sede quietus,
Hunc vocat octavus Bonifacius; altius ilium
Promovet; hic renuit Ravennae praesul haberi.
Fit comes invictus simul hinc et marchio tandem,
Et Romam rediit: Domini sub mille trecentis
(Quatuor amotis) annis: tumulante Minerva.
Surripit hunc festiva dies, & prima Novembris.
Guadia cum Sanctis tenet Omnibus inde sacerdos:
Pro quo perpetuo datur haec celebrare capella.
The _Rationale_ was the first work, from the pen of an uninspired
writer, ever printed. The _editio princeps_ appeared at the press of
Fust in 1459; being preceded only by the Psalters of 1457 and 1459. It
is, of course, of the most extreme rarity: the beauty of the
typography has seldom been exceeded. Chalmers mentions, besides this,
thirteen editions in the fifteenth, and thirteen in the sixteenth
century: all of them are very rare.
{xi}
The editions with which we are acquainted, are those of Rome 1473;
Lyons 1503, 1512, 1534, 1584; Antwerp 1570; Venice 1599, 1609. The
translation has been made from the editions of 1473 and 1599. The
former is a magnificent specimen of typography: the words are
excessively contracted; and there are double columns to each page. Our
copy is partially illuminated; and the binding is ornamented with a
border of the Evangelistic Symbols. The latter contains also the first
edition of the work of Beleth, and is a reprint of Doard's Lyons
edition of 1565. Doard dedicated it to his brother, Bishop of
Marseilles; and prefixed a Preface, in which he bestows a well-merited
eulogium on Durandus, and mentions the care taken in correcting and
revising the work. He also added some notes, of little worth. The
Venice reprint is so vicious a specimen of typography, that from it
alone the sense could in many places hardly be explained. Our copy
belonged to Bishop White Kennett, who appears to have studied it
diligently.
We must now say a few words as on our own share in the work. With
respect to the Introduction, fully convinced as we are of the truth
and importance of the general principle maintained in it, we do not
wish to press, as matter of certainty, all or any of the minor details
into which that theory is carried. We believe, indeed, that the more
the subject has been studied, the more truthful our views will appear
to be: but we wish the reader to bear in mind, that the weakness of
any portion of them is no argument against their reception, as a
whole. At the same time, none can be more aware than ourselves how
much more ably such views might have been advocated: we have not,
however, spared {xii} time or pains in the study of the subject; 'and
if we have done meanly, it is that we could attain unto.'
In the Translation, we have endeavoured, too often unsuccessfully, to
retain the beautiful simplicity of the original. In the obscure
passages, of which there are not a few, we have mentioned the
difficulty in the notes, lest the reader, by our mistake, should be
led into error himself.
The quotations from Holy Scripture are given in the authorised
version, except where, to bring out the author's full meaning, it was
necessary to have recourse to the Vulgate; and we have then translated
literally from that.
We have felt no small pleasure in thus enabling this excellent
prelate, though at so far distant a land from his own, and after a
silence of nearly six hundred years, being dead, yet to speak: and if
the following pages are at all useful in pointing out the sacramental
character of Catholic art, we shall be abundantly rewarded, as being
fellow-workers with him in the setting forth of one, now too much
forgotten, Church principle.
J. M. N.
B. W.
_Michaelmas_, 1842.
INTRODUCTORY ESSAY
----
SACRAMENTALITY: A PRINCIPLE OF
ECCLESIASTICAL DESIGN
ANALYSIS OF THE INTRODUCTORY ESSAY
INTRODUCTION.
1. Spread of the study of Church Architecture.
2. Obvious, but indefinable, difference between old and new churches.
Wherein this consists.
Not in association,
Nor in correctness of details,
Nor in the Picturesque,
Nor in the Mechanical advantages,
But in Reality considered, in an enlarged view, as Sacramentality.
3. This probable,
from examples, and
promises in Holy Scripture.
Catholic consent,
examples to the contrary,
philosophical reasons.
4. Enunciation of the subject.
5. Writers on the subject,
Pugin, Poole, Lewis, Coddington, the writers of the
Cambridge Camden Society.
A. ARGUMENTS FOR SYMBOLISM.
I. A PRIORI.
Symbolising spirit of Catholic Antiquity, in
(a) Interpretation of Holy Scriptures.
(b) Analogy of the Jewish Ceremonies.
(c) Private manners.
(d) Emblems in Catacombs, etc.
(e) Symbolical interpretation of Heathen writers.
II. ANALOGICAL.
i. Examples of other nations.
(a) Jews.
(1) Temple rites.
(2) Legal observances.
(3) Sacred books.
(b) Turks.
(c) Infidels.
(1) Hindu and Egyptian Mythology
(2) Persian Poetry.
(d) Heretics.
{xvi}
ii. From Nature.
(a) Trinity.
(b) Resurrection.
(c) Self-sacrifice,
iii. From Art.
(a) Sculpture,
(b) Painting.
(c) Music.
(d) Language of Flowers.
iv. Parabolical teaching.
III. PHILOSOPHICAL.
Objective answering to Subjective.
All effect sacramental of the efficient.
Sacramentality of all Religion.
Ritualism peculiarly and necessarily sacramental.
Church Architecture, a condition of Ritualism.
Necessities induce accidents: and these material expressions.
Example:
Necessities of Ritualism, and their expressions in earlier
and later ages.
Hence Symbolism.
Essential.
Intended.
Conventional, which again becomes intended.
IV. ANALYTICAL.
1. Cruciformity.
2. Ascent to Altar.
3. Orientation.
4. Verticality.
V. INDUCTIVE.
Express and continuous testimony.
(a) Apostolical Constitutions.
(b) Eusebius.
(c) Symbolical writers.
Actual examples.
VI. RECAPITULATION.
B. EXAMPLES OF SYMBOLISM.
I. DOCTRINES.
(a) The Holy Trinity, set forth in
i. Nave and Two Aisles.
ii. Chancel, Nave and Apse,
iii. Clerestory, Triforium, and Pier Arches,
iv. Triple windows.
v. Altar steps.
vi. Triplicity of mouldings,
vii. Minor details.
(b) Regeneration.
i. The octagonal form of Fonts,
ii. The octagonal form of Piers,
iii. Fishes.
(c) Atonement.
i. Cruciformity.
ii. Deviation of Orientation.
iii. Double Cross,
iv. The threat Rood.
v. Details.
(d) Communion of Saints.
II. DETAILS.
(a) Windows: a series of examples.
(b) Doors.
i. Norman tympana.
ii. Double doors in Early English.
(a) These explained in two ways,
(1) Christ's entrance into the world.
(2) Our entrance into the kingdom of heaven.
(b) Difference between mouldings of Chancel arches and doors.
(c) Porches.
(d) Chancel Arch and Rood Screen.
(e) Monuments.
(a) Difference of ancient and modern symbolism in these,
(1) Sceptical character of the present age.
(2) Paganism of modern design.
(3) Reality of ancient design.
(b) Historical details of Monuments.
(f) Gurgoyles and Poppyheads.
(g) Flowers used in architecture.
C. OBJECTIONS ANSWERED.
1. Inequality of type and antitype.
2. Difference of Symbolism in the same arrangement.
3. Mechanical origin.
D. HISTORY OF SYMBOLISM.
1. Norman; as symbolising facts.
2. Early English; as symbolising doctrines.
3. Decorated; as symbolising the connection of doctrines.
4. Perpendicular; as symbolising the progress of Erastianism.
5. Flamboyant, etc.
6. Post Reformation Symbolism.
E. CONCLUSION.
Contrast between a modern and ancient Church.
_Laus Deo_
{xix}
INTRODUCTORY ESSAY
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTORY
The study of Church Architecture has within the last few years become
so general, and a love for it so widely diffused, that whereas, in a
former generation it was a task to excite either, in the present it is
rather an object to direct both. An age of church-building, such as
this, ought to produce good architects, not only from the great
encouragement given to their professional efforts, but from the
increasing appreciation of the principles and powers of their art. And
yet it cannot be denied, however we may account for the fact, that (at
least among those for whom we write, the members of our own
communion), no architect has as yet arisen, who appears destined to be
the reviver of Christian art. It is not that the rules of the science
have not been studied, that the examples bequeathed to us have not
been imitated, that the details are not understood. We have (though
they are but few) modern buildings of the most perfect proportions, of
the most faultless details, and reared with lavish expense. It is that
there is an undefined--perhaps almost undefinable--difference between
a true 'old church,' and the most perfect of modern temples. In the
former, at least till late in the Perpendicular era, we feel that,
however {xx} strange the proportions, or extraordinary the details,
the effect is church-like. In the latter, we may not be able to blame;
but from a certain feeling of unsatisfactoriness, we cannot praise.
The solution of the problem,--What is it that causes this difference?
has been often attempted, sometimes with partial, but never with
complete, success. That most commonly given is the following:--The
effect of association in old buildings,--the mellowing power of
time,--the evident antiquity of surrounding objects,--the natural
beauties of foliage, moss, and ivy, that require centuries to reach
perfection;--as on the other hand, the bareness, the newness, nay even
the sharpness and vigour of new work; these, it is said, are
sufficient to stamp a different character on each. There is doubtless
something in this; but that it is not the whole cause is evident from
the fact, that give a modern church all the above mentioned advantages
on paper, and an experienced eye will soon detect it to be modern.
Those writers who, as Grose, Milner, and Carter, lived before the
details of Christian art were understood, seem to have placed its
perfection in a thorough knowledge of these: experience has proved
them wrong. Others, as Mr. Petit, [Footnote 3] have made a kind of
ideal picturesque; and, having exalted the phantasm into an idol, have
fallen down and worshipped it. Others, again, have sought for an
explanation of the difficulty in mathematical contrivance and
mechanical ingenuity; and the result has been little more than the
discovery of curious eave-drains, and wonderful cast-iron roof-work.
Lastly, Mr. Pugin (_cum talis sis, utinain noster esses!_) has placed
the thing required in _Reality_. {xxi} That is, to quote his own
words, in making these the two great rules of design:--
1. That there should be no features about a building which are not
necessary for convenience, construction, or propriety:
2. That all ornament should consist of enrichment of the essential
construction of a building.' [Footnote 4] And we may add, as a
corollary, still quoting the same writer:--'The smallest detail should
have a meaning or serve a purpose: the construction itself should vary
with the material employed: and the designs should be adapted to the
material in which they are to be executed.' Still, most true and most
important as are these remarks, we must insist on one more axiom,
otherwise Christian art will but mock us, and not show us wherein its
great strength lieth.
[Footnote 3: See the review of his work in the _Ecclesiologist_,
vol. i, pp. 91-105.]
[Footnote 4: Pugin's 'True Principles,' p. 1.]
A Catholic architect must be a Catholic in heart. Simple knowledge
will no more enable a man to build up God's material, than His
spiritual temples. In ancient times, the finest buildings were
designed by the holiest bishops. Wykeham and Poore will occur to every
churchman. And we have every reason to believe, from God's Word, from
Catholic consent, and even from philosophical principles, that such
must always be the case.
Holy Scripture, in mentioning the selection of Bezaleel and Aholiab,
as architects of the Tabernacle, expressly asserts them to have been
filled 'with the Spirit of God in wisdom, and in understanding, and in
knowledge, and in all manner of workmanship, to devise cunning works,
to work in gold, and in silver and in brass, and in cutting of stones
to set them, and in carving of timber, to work in all manner of
workmanship.' And this indeed is only a part of the blessing of the
pure in heart: they see God, the Fountain of Beauty, even in this
life; as they shall see Him, the Fountain of Holiness, in the {xxii}
next. From Catholic consent we may learn the same truth. Why else was
Ecclesiastical Architecture made a part of the profession of Clerks,
than because it was considered that the purity and holiness of that
profession fitted them best for so great a work? [Footnote 5]
[Footnote 5: Compare the general drift of the Address to Paulinus.
_Eusebius_. H. E. X. 4.]
Nay, we have remarkable proofs that feeling without knowledge will do
more than knowledge without feeling. There are instances of
buildings--Lisbon cathedral and S. Peter's College chapel, Cambridge,
are cases in point--which, with Debased or Italian details, have
nevertheless Christian effect. And we have several similar cases, more
particularly in the way of towers.
Now, allowing the respectability, which attaches itself to the
profession of a modern architect, and the high character of many in
that profession, none would assert that they, as a body, make it a
matter of devotion and prayer; that they work for the Church alone
regardless of themselves; that they build in faith, and to the glory
of God.
In truth, architecture has become too much a profession: it is made
the means of gaining a livelihood, and is viewed as a path to
honourable distinction, instead of being the study of the devout
ecclesiastic, who matures his noble conceptions with the advantage of
that profound meditation only attainable in the contemplative life,
who, without thought of recompense or fame, has no end in view but the
raising a temple, worthy of its high end, and emblematical of the
faith which is to be maintained within its walls. It is clear that
modern architects are in a very different position from their
predecessors, with respect to these advantages. We are not prepared to
say that none but monks ought to design churches, or that it is
impossible for a professional {xxiii} architect to build with the
devotion and faith of an earlier time. But we do protest against the
merely business-like spirit of the modern profession, and demand from
them a more elevated and directly religious habit of mind. We surely
ought to look at least for church-membership from one who ventures to
design a church. There cannot be a more painful idea than that a
separatist should be allowed to build a House of God, when he himself
knows nothing of the ritual and worship of the Church from which he
has strayed; to prepare both font and altar, when perchance he knows
nothing of either Sacrament but that he has always despised them. Or,
again, to think that any churchman should allow himself to build a
conventicle, and even sometimes to prostitute the speaking
architecture of the Church to the service of Her bitterest enemies!
What idea can such a person have formed of the reality of church
architecture? Conceive a churchman designing a triple window, admitted
emblem of the Most Holy Trinity, for a congregation of Socinians! We
wish to vindicate the dignity of this noble science against the
treason of its own professors. If architecture is anything more than a
mere trade; if it is indeed a liberal, intellectual art, a true branch
of poesy, let us prize its reality and meaning and truthfulness, and
at least not expose ourselves by giving to two contraries one and the
same material expression.
It is objected that architects have a right to the same professional
conscience that is claimed, for instance, by a barrister. To which we
can only reply, that it must be a strange morality which will justify
a pleader in violating truth; and how much worse for an architect to
violate truth in things immediately connected with the House and
worship of God? It may be asked, Do we mean to imply then that a
church architect ought never {xxiv} to undertake any secular building?
Perhaps, as things are, we cannot expect so much as this now: but we
can never believe that the man who engages to design union-houses, or
prisons, or assembly-rooms, and gives the dregs of his time to
church-building, is likely to produce a good church, or, in short, can
expect to be filled from above with the Spirit of Wisdom. The church
architect must, we are persuaded, make very great sacrifices: he must
forego all lucrative undertakings, if they may not be carried through
upon those principles which he believes necessary for every good
building; and particularly if the end to be answered, or the wants to
be provided for, are in themselves unjustifiable or mischievous. Even
in church-building itself, he must see many an unworthy rival
preferred to him, who will condescend to pander to the whims and
comfort of a church-committee, will suit his design to any standard of
ritualism which may be suggested by his own ignorance, or others'
private judgment, who will consent to defile a building meant for
God's worship with pews and galleries and prayer-pulpits and
commodious vestries. But hard as the trial may be, a church architect
must submit to it, rather than recede from the principles which he
knows to be the very foundation of his art. We would go further even,
and deny the possibility of any architect's success in all the
different styles of Pointed architecture, not to mention the orders of
Greece and Rome, Vitruvian, Palladian, Cinque Cento, Wrennian, nay
even Chinese, Swiss, Hindoo, and Egyptian at once. We have not even
now exhausted the list of styles in which a modern architect is
supposed to be able to design. It is even more absurd than if every
modern painter were expected, and should profess, to paint equally
well in the styles of Perugino, Francia, Raphael, Holbein, Claude, the
Poussins, Salvator Rosa, Correggio, Van Eyck, {xxv} Teniers, Rubens,
Murillo, Reynolds, West, Gainsborough, Overbeck, and Copley Fielding
all at once! An architect ought indeed to be acquainted, and the more
the better, with all styles of building: but if architecture, as we
said before, is a branch of poesy, if the poet's mind is to have any
individuality, he must design in one style, and one style only. For
the Anglican architect, it will be necessary to know enough of the
earlier styles to be able to restore the deeply interesting churches,
which they have left us as precious heirlooms; enough of the Debased
styles, to take warning from their decline: but for his own style, he
should choose the glorious architecture of the fourteenth century;
and, just as no man has more than one hand-writing, so in this one
language alone will he express his architectural ideas.
We cannot leave this topic without referring to what the Cambridge
Camden Society has said with respect to architectural competition.
[Footnote 6] _It is a fact_ that at this time many competing designs
are manufactured in an architect's office, by some of his clerks, as
if by machinery: if a given plan is chosen, the architect is summoned,
and sees _his_ (!) design for the first time, when he is introduced to
the smiling committee-men. It is another fact that there is at this
time in London a small body of persons, with no other qualification
than that of having been draughtsmen in an architect's office, who
_get up_ a set of competing designs for any aspirant who chooses to
give them a few instructions, and to pay them for their trouble. How
much it is to be wished that there were some examination of an
architect's qualifications, before he should be allowed to assume the
name! It seems strange that the more able members of the profession do
not themselves feel some _esprit de corps_, and do not at {xxvi} least
endeavour to claim for their art its full dignity and importance. We
fear however that very few, as yet, take that _religions_ view of
their profession, which we have shown to be seemly, even if not
essential. If, however, we succeed in proving that religion enters
very largely into the principles of church architecture, a religious
_ethos_, we repeat, is _essential_ to a church architect. At all
events, in an investigation into the differences between ancient and
modern church architecture, the contrast between the ancient and
modern builders could not be overlooked: and it is not too much to
hope that some, at least, may be struck by the fact, that the deeply
religious habits of the builders of old, the hours, the cloister, the
discipline, the obedience, resulted in their matchless works; while
the worldliness, vanity, dissipation, and patronage of our own
architects issue in unvarying and hopeless failure.
[Footnote 6: See _Ecclesiologist_, vol. i, pp. 69, 85.]
We said that there were philosophical reasons for the belief that we
must have architects--before we can have buildings--like those of old.
If it be true that an esoteric signification, or, as we shall call it,
_Sacramentality_, [Footnote 7] ran through all the arrangements and
details of Christian architecture, emblematical of Christian
discipline, and suggested by Christian devotion; then must the
discipline have been practised, and the devotion felt, before a
Christian temple can be reared. That this esoteric meaning, or
symbolism, does exist, we are now to endeavour to prove.
[Footnote 7: It may be proper to distinguish between five terms, too
generally vaguely employed in common, and which we shall often have
occasion to use: we mean, _allegorical, symbolical, typical,
figurative_, and _sacramental_.
'Allegory employs fictitious things and personages to shadow out the
truth: Symbolism uses real personages and real actions (and real
things) as symbols of the truth:' _British Critic_, No. lxv. p. 121.
Sacramentality is symbolism applied to the truth [Greek text], the
teaching of the Church, by the hands of the teacher: a Type is a
symbol intended from the first: a Figure is a symbol not discovered
till after the thing figurative has had a being.]
{xxvii}
We assert, then, that _Sacramentality_ is that characteristic which so
strikingly distinguishes ancient ecclesiastical architecture from our
own. By this word we mean to convey the idea that, by the outward and
visible form, is signified something inward and spiritual: that the
material fabric symbolises, embodies, figures, represents, expresses,
answers to, some abstract meaning. Consequently, unless this ideal be
itself true, or be rightly understood, he who seeks to build a
Christian church may embody a false or incomplete or mistaken ideal,
but will not develope the true one. Hence, while the Parthenon, or a
conventicle, or a modern church, may be conceived to have, on the one
hand, so much _truthfulness_, as to symbolise respectively the
graceful, but pagan, worship of Athene--the private judgment of the
dissenter--and the warped or ill-understood or puritanised religious
ethos of the modern churchman; and, on the other hand, to have so much
_reality_ as to carry out most satisfactorily Mr. Pugin's canons; yet,
inasmuch as in neither case was the builder's ideal the true one, so
in neither case is his architecture in any way adapted to, or an
embodiment of, the ideal of the Church. Reality, then, is not of
itself sufficient. What can be more _real_ than a pyramid, yet what
less Christian? It must be Christian reality, the true expression of a
true ideal, which makes Catholic architecture what it is. This
Christian reality, we would call _Sacramentality_; investing that
symbolical truthfulness, which it has in common with _every_ true
expression, with a greater force and holiness, both from the greater
purity of the perfect truth which it embodies, and from the
association which this name will give it with those adorable and
consummate examples of the same {xxviii} principle, infinitely more
developed, and infinitely more holy in the spiritual grace which they
signify and convey,--the Blessed Sacraments of the Church.
The modern writers who have treated on Symbolism seem to have taken
respectively very partial views of the subject. Mr. Pugin does not
seem in his books to recognise the particular principle which we have
enunciated. We have shown that his law about Reality is true so far as
it goes, but that it does not go far enough. He himself, for example,
is now contemplating a work on the reality of domestic, as before of
ecclesiastical, architecture. Now, nothing can be more true, nothing
more useful, than this. Yet even he does not seem to have discerned
that as contact with the Church endues with a new sanctity, and
elevates every form and every principle of art: so in a peculiar sense
the sacred end to which church architecture is subservient, elevates
and sanctifies that reality which must be a condition of its goodness
in common with _all_ good architecture; in short, raises this
principle of Reality into one of Sacramentality. We should be sorry to
assert that Mr. Pugin does not feel this, though we are not aware that
he has expressed it in his writings: but in his most lasting writings,
his churches namely, it is clear that the principle, if not
intentionally even, and if only incompletely, has not been without a
great influence on that master mind. Yet even in these we could point
to details, and in some of his earlier works to something more than
details, which shew that there is something wanting; that in the bold
expedients and fearless licence which his genius has led him to
employ, he has occasionally gone wrong; not from the fact of his
departure from strict precedent, and his vindication of a certain
architectural freedom, but because in these escapements from
authority, he has not invariably kept in view the { xxix} principle
now advocated. However the author of the 'True Principles' might point
to his churches, to prove that a reverent and religious mind, employed
in administering to the material wants of the Church, (even though
that reverence be misapplied, and that Church in a schismatical
position), cannot fail to succeed, at least in some degree, in
stamping upon his work the impress of his own faith and zeal, and in
making it, at least to some extent, a living development and
expression of the true ideal.
Mr. Poole, the author of the 'Appropriate Character of Church
Architecture,' would appear to believe the symbolism of details rather
than any general principle. He was the first, we think, to reassert
that the octagonal form of fonts was figurative of Regeneration. In
the latter edition of his Book he has adopted several of the
symbolical interpretations advanced by the writers of the Cambridge
Camden Society.
Mr. Lewis, in his illustrations of Kilpeck church (in an appendix to
which he has printed a translation of some part of the 'Rationale' of
our author), has given a treatise on symbolism generally, and has
applied his principles to the explanation of the plan and details of
that particular church. His book excited some attention at the time of
publication, and was met by considerable ridicule in many quarters. To
this we think it was fairly open, since the author did not seem to
have grasped the true view of the subject. He appears to believe that,
from the very first, _all_ church architecture was _intentionally_
symbolical. Now this is an unlikely supposition, inasmuch as till
church architecture was fully developed, we do not think that its real
significancy was understood to its full extent by those who used it.
That it was, in its imperfect state, symbolical, we should be the last
to deny; but it seems more in accordance {xxx} with probability, and
more in analogy with the progress of other arts, to believe that at
first certain given wants induced and compelled certain adaptations to
those wants: which then _did_ symbolise the wants themselves; and
which afterwards became intentionally symbolical. Now such a view as
this will explain satisfactorily how a Christian church might be
progressively developed from a Basilican model. Mr. Hope, in his essay
on Architecture, carries us back to the very earliest expedient likely
to be adopted by a savage to protect him from weather, and from this
derives every subsequent expansion of the art. Which may be true, and
probably is true, so far at least as this: that, however first
acquired, the elementary knowledge of any method of building would be,
like all other knowledge, continually receiving additions and
improvements, till from the first bower of branches sprang the
Parthenon, and from that again Cologne or Westminster. But then it is
clearly necessary to show some moral reason for so strange a
development, so complete a change of form and style. Now the theory
that the ethos of Catholic architects working upon the materials made
to hand, namely, the ancient orders of pagan architecture and (say)
the Basilican plan, gradually impressed itself upon these unpromising
elements, and progressively developed from them a transcript of that
ethos in Christian architecture, is intelligible at least, and
presents no such difficulty as Mr. Lewis's supposition that ancient
architects (he does not say when, or how long--but take Kilpeck church
and say _Norman_ architects) designed intentionally on symbolical
principles. We want in this case to be informed when the change took
place, from what period architects began to symbolise intentionally,
at what time they forgot the traditions of church-building, which they
must have had, and commenced to carry new principles into practice.
{xxxi} Nor, on this supposition, do we see why there should have been
any progressive development, why the Basilican and Debased-Pagan
trammels were not cast away at once; nor why, if the _ideal_ of the
Norman architect was true and perfect (that is if he were a true
Catholic), its expression should not have been so too: nor why any
Norman symbolism, thus originated, should ever have been discarded (as
it has been in later styles), instead of remaining an integral and
essential part of the material expression of the Church's mind. Now
our view appears to be open to no such objection. On the one hand
there are given materials to work upon, and on the other a given
spirit which is to mould and inform the mass. The contest goes on:
mind gradually subdues matter, until in the complete development of
Christian architecture we see the projection of the mind of the
Church. It is quite in analogy with the history and nature of the
Church, and with the workings of God's providence with respect to it,
that there should be this gradual expansion and development of truth.
We foresee the objection that will be raised against fixing on any
period as that of the full ripeness of Christian art, and are prepared
for many sneers at our advocacy of the perfection of the Edwardian
architecture. But we are assured that, if there is any truth (not to
say in what is advanced in this essay, but) in what has ever been
proposed by any who have appreciated the genius of Pointed
Architecture--to confine ourselves to our own subject--no other period
can be chosen at which all conditions of beauty, of detail, of general
effect, of truthfulness, of reality are so fully answered as in this.
And from this spring two important considerations. Firstly, the
decline of Christian art--which may be traced from this very period,
if architecture be tried by any of the conditions which have been laid
down--was confessedly {xxxii} coincident with, and (if what we have
said is true) was really symbolical of, those corruptions, which ended
in the great rending of the Latin Church; the effects of, and
penalties for, which remain to this day in full operation in the whole
of Western Christendom. Secondly, the Decorated style may be indeed
the finest development of Christian architecture which the world has
yet seen; but it does not follow that it is the greatest perfection
which shall ever be arrived at. No: we too look forward, if it may be,
to the time when even a new style of church architecture shall be
given us, so glorious and beautiful and true, that Cologne will sink
into a fine example of a transitional period, when the zeal and faith
and love of the reunited Church shall find their just expression in
the sacramental forms of Catholic art.
But besides the above objection to Mr. Lewis's theory we may mention
the arbitrary way in which he determines on things which are to be
symbolised, and then violently endeavours to find their expected
types. This is quite at variance with the practice of any sober
symbolist; and more especially (as we shall hereafter have occasion to
point out) with that of Durandus. This forced sort of symbolism
naturally leads to a disregard of precedent and authority: and
accordingly we remember to have heard of a design by this gentleman
for the arrangement of a chancel which professed to symbolise certain
facts and doctrines; but which, whatever might be the ingenuity of the
symbolism, was no less opposed to the constant rule of arrangement in
ancient churches, than it was practically absurd and inconvenient for
the purpose which it was meant to answer. Indeed, while Mr. Lewis
insists strongly on the symbolising of facts, he does not succeed in
grasping any general principle, any more than he sees the {xxxiii}
difficulty there is in the way of our receiving his supposition of an
intention to symbolise from the first. No architect ever sat down with
an analysed scheme of doctrines which he resolved to embody in his
future building: in this, as in any other department of poesy, the
result is harmonious, significant, and complete, and may be resolved
into its elements, though these elements might never have been laid by
the poet as the foundation upon which to raise his superstructure.
That were like De La Harpe's theory that an epic poet should first
determine on his moral, and then draw out such a plan for his poem as
may enable him to illustrate that moral. [Footnote 8]
[Footnote 8: It is with pain that we have spoken of Mr. Lewis at
all, because every Ecclesiologist owes him a debt for his great
boldness in turning the public attention to the subject of
symbolism. Yet we believe that a prejudice has been excited by him
against that subject which it will be hard to get over; for we are
constrained to say, that greater absurdities were never printed than
some which have appeared in his book. His explanations of the west
end of Kilpeck church--his cool assumption when any bracket appears
more puzzling than usual that it is of later work, and therefore not
explainable--his random perversions of Scripture--his puerile
conceits about the door--deserve this criticism. This same south
door he extols as a perfect mine of ecclesiastical information,
while he confesses himself unable to explain the symbols wrought on
the two orders of the arch--that is about two-thirds of the whole!
It is strange, too, that in his restoration of the church, he should
have forgotten all about the bells--and have violated a fundamental
canon of symbolism, by terminating his western gable in a plain
Cross.]
The writers of the Cambridge Camden Society have carried out the
system more fully and consistently than any others. It has evidently
grown upon them, during the process of their inquiries: yet in their
earliest publications, we trace, though more obscurely, the same
thing. Their 'Few Words to Church-Builders' acknowledged the principle
to a far greater length; and the _Ecclesiologist_ has always acted
upon it, even when not expressly referring to it. As a necessary
consequence, they were the first who dwelt on the absolute necessity
of a distinct and spacious chancel; the first who recommended, and
{xxxiv} where they could, insisted on, the re-introduction of the
rood-screen; and the first to condemn the use of western triplets. The
position and shape of the font, the necessity of orientation, and some
few details, they have, but only in common with others, urged.
The Oxford Architectural Society have never recognised any given
principles: and in consequence Littlemore is proposed by them as a
model--a church either without, or else all, chancel; and either way a
solecism.
As might have been expected from a separatist, Rickman, in his
treatise, gives not a single line to the principle for which we
contend. Mr. Bloxam, in his excellent little work, though often
referring to it--more especially in the later editions which have
appeared since the labours of the Cambridge Camden Society--yet
hardly gives it that prominence which we might have expected from one
who possesses so just an idea of mediaeval arrangements and art.
Among the chief opposers of the system we may mention Mr. Coddington
of Ware, who sees perfection in the clumsiness of Basilican
arrangements, and schism in the developed art of the middle ages. This
writer, as it has been observed in the _Ecclesiologist_, contends for
two things:--1. That one great object of Romanism was to abolish the
distinction between the clergy and laity: 2. That another great object
of the same Church, acting by its monks, (or, as he calls them,
schismatical communities) was to exalt the clergy unduly above the
laity. The former assertion he does not attempt to prove: the latter
he supports by pointing to the arrangement of the rood-screen, which,
therefore, like the French Ambonoclasts, he wishes to pull down both
in cathedrals and churches.
{xxxv}
This brief review of the principal writers who have treated on the
Symbolism of Churches and Church Ornaments, concludes our first
chapter. In it we have endeavoured to point out an acknowledged
desideratum; to shew what suppositions have been advanced on the
subject; to set forth wherein, and for what reason, they fail of being
satisfactory; to enunciate the principle of _Sacramentality_ as
essential for the full appreciation and successful imitation of
ancient church architecture; and finally, in referring to the works of
some later symbolists, to shew why their hypotheses are incomplete or
untenable. We have also brought under review the glaring contrasts
between the methods of life of an ancient and modern architect; and,
if we may so say, between the machinery of designing and the habit of
mind in the two cases. We shall now proceed to examine those arguments
which may lead us to suspect that some such principle as
Sacramentality really exists.
{xxxvi}