§ LIX. How far beneath these two ranks of men shall we place, in the

scale of being, those whose pleasure is only in sin or in suffering; who

habitually contemplate humanity in poverty or decrepitude, fury or

sensuality; whose works are either temptations to its weakness, or

triumphs over its ruin, and recognize no other subjects for thought or

admiration than the subtlety of the robber, the rage of the soldier, or

the joy of the Sybarite. It seems strange, when thus definitely stated,

that such a school should exist. Yet consider a little what gaps and

blanks would disfigure our gallery and chamber walls, in places that we

have long approached with reverence, if every picture, every statue,

were removed from them, of which the subject was either the vice or the

misery of mankind, portrayed without any moral purpose: consider the

innumerable groups having reference merely to various forms of passion,

low or high; drunken revels and brawls among peasants, gambling or

fighting scenes among soldiers, amours and intrigues among every class,

brutal battle pieces, banditti subjects, gluts of torture and death in

famine, wreck, or slaughter, for the sake merely of the

excitement,--that quickening and suppling of the dull spirit that cannot

be gained for it but by bathing it in blood, afterward to wither back

into stained and stiffened apathy; and then that whole vast false heaven

of sensual passion, full of nymphs, satyrs, graces, goddesses, and I

know not what, from its high seventh circle in Correggio's Antiope, down

to the Grecized ballet-dancers and smirking Cupids of the Parisian

upholsterer. Sweep away all this, remorselessly, and see how much art we

should have left.

§ LX. And yet these are only the grossest manifestations of the tendency

of the school. There are subtler, yet not less certain, signs of it in

the works of men who stand high in the world's list of sacred painters.

I doubt not that the reader was surprised when I named Murillo among the

men of this third rank. Yet, go into the Dulwich Gallery, and meditate

for a little over that much celebrated picture of the two beggar boys,

one eating lying on the ground, the other standing beside him. We have

among our own painters one who cannot indeed be set beside Murillo as a

painter of Madonnas, for he is a pure Naturalist, and, never having seen

a Madonna, does not paint any; but who, as a painter of beggar or

peasant boys, may be set beside Murillo, or any one else,--W. Hunt. He

loves peasant boys, because he finds them more roughly and picturesquely

dressed, and more healthily colored, than others. And he paints all

that he sees in them fearlessly; all the health and humor, and

freshness, and vitality, together with such awkwardness and stupidity,

and what else of negative or positive harm there may be in the creature;

but yet so that on the whole we love it, and find it perhaps even

beautiful, or if not, at least we see that there is capability of good

in it, rather than of evil; and all is lighted up by a sunshine and

sweet color that makes the smock-frock as precious as cloth of gold. But

look at those two ragged and vicious vagrants that Murillo has gathered

out of the street. You smile at first, because they are eating so

naturally, and their roguery is so complete. But is there anything else

than roguery there, or was it well for the painter to give his time to

the painting of those repulsive and wicked children? Do you feel moved

with any charity towards children as you look at them? Are we the least

more likely to take any interest in ragged schools, or to help the next

pauper child that comes in our way, because the painter has shown us a

cunning beggar feeding greedily? Mark the choice of the act. He might

have shown hunger in other ways, and given interest to even this act of

eating, by making the face wasted, or the eye wistful. But he did not

care to do this. He delighted merely in the disgusting manner of eating,

the food filling the cheek; the boy is not hungry, else he would not

turn round to talk and grin as he eats.

§ LXI. But observe another point in the lower figure. It lies so that

the sole of the foot is turned towards the spectator; not because it

would have lain less easily in another attitude, but that the painter

may draw, and exhibit, the grey dust engrained in the foot. Do not call

this the painting of nature: it is mere delight in foulness. The lesson,

if there be any, in the picture, is not one whit the stronger. We all

know that a beggar's bare foot cannot be clean; there is no need to

thrust its degradation into the light, as if no human imagination were

vigorous enough for its conception.

§ LXII. The position of the Sensualists, in treatment of landscape, is

less distinctly marked than in that of the figure: because even the

wildest passions of nature are noble: but the inclination is manifested

by carelessness in marking generic form in trees and flowers: by their

preferring confused and irregular arrangements of foliage or foreground

to symmetrical and simple grouping; by their general choice of such

picturesqueness as results from decay, disorder, and disease, rather

than of that which is consistent with the perfection of the things in

which it is found; and by their imperfect rendering of the elements of

strength and beauty in all things. I propose to work out this subject

fully in the last volume of "Modern Painters;" but I trust that enough

has been here said to enable the reader to understand the relations of

the three great classes of artists, and therefore also the kinds of

morbid condition into which the two higher (for the last has no other

than a morbid condition) are liable to fall. For, since the function of

the Naturalists is to represent, as far as may be, the whole of nature,

and the Purists to represent what is absolutely good for some special

purpose or time, it is evident that both are liable to error from

shortness of sight, and the last also from weakness of judgment. I say,

in the first place, both may err from shortness of sight, from not

seeing all that there is in nature; seeing only the outsides of things,

or those points of them which bear least on the matter in hand. For

instance, a modern continental Naturalist sees the anatomy of a limb

thoroughly, but does not see its color against the sky, which latter

fact is to a painter far the more important of the two. And because it

is always easier to see the surface than the depth of things, the full

sight of them requiring the highest powers of penetration, sympathy, and

imagination, the world is full of vulgar Naturalists: not Sensualists,

observe, not men who delight in evil; but men who never see the deepest

good, and who bring discredit on all painting of Nature by the little

that they discover in her. And the Purist, besides being liable to this

same shortsightedness, is liable also to fatal errors of judgment; for

he may think that good which is not so, and that the highest good which

is the least. And thus the world is full of vulgar Purists,[64] who

bring discredit on all selection by the silliness of their choice; and

this the more, because the very becoming a Purist is commonly indicative

of some slight degree of weakness, readiness to be offended, or

narrowness of understanding of the ends of things: the greatest men

being, in all times of art, Naturalists, without any exception; and the

greatest Purists being those who approach nearest to the Naturalists, as

Benozzo Gozzoli and Perugino. Hence there is a tendency in the

Naturalists to despise the Purists, and in the Purists to be offended

with the Naturalists (not understanding them, and confounding them with

the Sensualists); and this is grievously harmful to both.

§ LXIII. Of the various forms of resultant mischief it is not here the

place to speak: the reader may already be somewhat wearied with a

statement which has led us apparently so far from our immediate subject.

But the digression was necessary, in order that I might clearly define

the sense in which I use the word Naturalism when I state it to be the

third most essential characteristic of Gothic architecture. I mean that

the Gothic builders belong to the central or greatest rank in _both_ the

classifications of artists which we have just made; that, considering

all artists as either men of design, men of facts, or men of both, the

Gothic builders were men of both; and that again, considering all

artists as either Purists, Naturalists, or Sensualists, the Gothic

builders were Naturalists.

§ LXIV. I say first, that the Gothic builders were of that central class

which unites fact with design; but that the part of the work which was

more especially their own was the truthfulness. Their power of

artistical invention or arrangement was not greater than that of

Romanesque and Byzantine workmen: by those workmen they were taught the

principles, and from them received their models, of design; but to the

ornamental feeling and rich fancy of the Byzantine the Gothic builder

added a love of _fact_ which is never found in the South. Both Greek and

Roman used conventional foliage in their ornament, passing into

something that was not foliage at all, knotting itself into strange

cup-like buds or clusters, and growing out of lifeless rods instead of

stems; the Gothic sculptor received these types, at first, as things

that ought to be, just as we have a second time received them; but he

could not rest in them. He saw there was no veracity in them, no

knowledge, no vitality. Do what he would, he could not help liking the

true leaves better; and cautiously, a little at a time, he put more of

nature into his work, until at last it was all true, retaining,

nevertheless, every valuable character of the original well-disciplined

and designed arrangement.[65]

§ LXV. Nor is it only in external and visible subject that the Gothic

workman wrought for truth: he is as firm in his rendering of imaginative

as of actual truth; that is to say, when an idea would have been by a

Roman, or Byzantine, symbolically represented, the Gothic mind realizes

it to the utmost. For instance, the purgatorial fire is represented in

the mosaic of Torcello (Romanesque) as a red stream, longitudinally

striped like a riband, descending out of the throne of Christ, and

gradually extending itself to envelope the wicked. When we are once

informed what this means, it is enough for its purpose; but the Gothic

inventor does not leave the sign in need of interpretation. He makes the

fire as like real fire as he can; and in the porch of St. Maclou at

Rouen the sculptured flames burst out of the Hades gate, and flicker up,

in writhing tongues of stone, through the interstices of the niches, as

if the church itself were on fire. This is an extreme instance, but it

is all the more illustrative of the entire difference in temper and

thought between the two schools of art, and of the intense love of

veracity which influenced the Gothic design.

§ LXVI. I do not say that this love of veracity is always healthy in its

operation. I have above noticed the errors into which it falls from

despising design; and there is another kind of error noticeable in the

instance just given, in which the love of truth is too hasty, and seizes

on a surface truth instead of an inner one. For in representing the

Hades fire, it is not the mere _form_ of the flame which needs most to

be told, but its unquenchableness, its Divine ordainment and limitation,

and its inner fierceness, not physical and material, but in being the

expression of the wrath of God. And these things are not to be told by

imitating the fire that flashes out of a bundle of sticks. If we think

over his symbol a little, we shall perhaps find that the Romanesque

builder told more truth in that likeness of a blood-red stream, flowing

between definite shores and out of God's throne, and expanding, as if

fed by a perpetual current, into the lake wherein the wicked are cast,

than the Gothic builder in those torch-flickerings about his niches. But

this is not to our immediate purpose; I am not at present to insist upon

the faults into which the love of truth was led in the later Gothic

times, but on the feeling itself, as a glorious and peculiar

characteristic of the Northern builders. For, observe, it is not, even

in the above instance, love of truth, but want of thought, which

_causes_ the fault. The love of truth, as such, is good, but when it is

misdirected by thoughtlessness or over-excited by vanity, and either

seizes on facts of small value, or gathers them chiefly that it may

boast of its grasp and apprehension, its work may well become dull or

offensive. Yet let us not, therefore, blame the inherent love of facts,

but the incautiousness of their selection, and impertinence of their

statement.

§ LXVII. I said, in the second place, that Gothic work, when referred to

the arrangement of all art, as purist, naturalist, or sensualist, was

naturalist. This character follows necessarily on its extreme love of

truth, prevailing over the sense of beauty, and causing it to take

delight in portraiture of every kind, and to express the various

characters of the human countenance and form, as it did the varieties of

leaves and the ruggedness of branches. And this tendency is both

increased and ennobled by the same Christian humility which we saw

expressed in the first character of Gothic work, its rudeness. For as

that resulted from a humility which confessed the imperfection of the

_workman_, so this naturalist portraiture is rendered more faithful by

the humility which confesses the imperfection of the _subject_. The

Greek sculptor could neither bear to confess his own feebleness, nor to

tell the faults of the forms that he portrayed. But the Christian

workman, believing that all is finally to work together for good, freely

confesses both, and neither seeks to disguise his own roughness of work,

nor his subject's roughness of make. Yet this frankness being joined,

for the most part, with depth of religious feeling in other directions,

and especially with charity, there is sometimes a tendency to Purism in

the best Gothic sculpture; so that it frequently reaches great dignity

of form and tenderness of expression, yet never so as to lose the

veracity of portraiture, wherever portraiture is possible: not exalting

its kings into demi-gods, nor its saints into archangels, but giving

what kingliness and sanctity was in them, to the full, mixed with due

record of their faults; and this in the most part with a great

indifference like that of Scripture history, which sets down, with

unmoved and unexcusing resoluteness, the virtues and errors of all men

of whom it speaks, often leaving the reader to form his own estimate of

them, without an indication of the judgment of the historian. And this

veracity is carried out by the Gothic sculptors in the minuteness and

generality, as well as the equity, of their delineation: for they do not

limit their art to the portraiture of saints and kings, but introduce

the most familiar scenes and most simple subjects; filling up the

backgrounds of Scripture histories with vivid and curious

representations of the commonest incidents of daily life, and availing

themselves of every occasion in which, either as a symbol, or an

explanation of a scene or time, the things familiar to the eye of the

workman could be introduced and made of account. Hence Gothic sculpture

and painting are not only full of valuable portraiture of the greatest

men, but copious records of all the domestic customs and inferior arts

of the ages in which it flourished.[66]

§ LXVIII. There is, however, one direction in which the Naturalism of

the Gothic workmen is peculiarly manifested; and this direction is even

more characteristic of the school than the Naturalism itself; I mean

their peculiar fondness for the forms of Vegetation. In rendering the

various circumstances of daily life, Egyptian and Ninevite sculpture is

as frank and as diffuse as the Gothic. From the highest pomps of state

or triumphs of battle, to the most trivial domestic arts and amusements,

all is taken advantage of to fill the field of granite with the

perpetual interest of a crowded drama; and the early Lombardic and

Romanesque sculpture is equally copious in its description of the

familiar circumstances of war and the chase. But in all the scenes

portrayed by the workmen of these nations, vegetation occurs only as an

explanatory accessory; the reed is introduced to mark the course of the

river, or the tree to mark the covert of the wild beast, or the ambush

of the enemy, but there is no especial interest in the forms of the

vegetation strong enough to induce them to make it a subject of separate

and accurate study. Again, among the nations who followed the arts of

design exclusively, the forms of foliage introduced were meagre and

general, and their real intricacy and life were neither admired nor

expressed. But to the Gothic workman the living foliage became a subject

of intense affection, and he struggled to render all its characters with

as much accuracy as was compatible with the laws of his design and the

nature of his material, not unfrequently tempted in his enthusiasm to

transgress the one and disguise the other.

§ LXIX. There is a peculiar significancy in this, indicative both of

higher civilization and gentler temperament, than had before been

manifested in architecture. Rudeness, and the love of change, which we

have insisted upon as the first elements of Gothic, are also elements

common to all healthy schools. But here is a softer element mingled with

them, peculiar to the Gothic itself. The rudeness or ignorance which

would have been painfully exposed in the treatment of the human form,

are still not so great as to prevent the successful rendering of the

wayside herbage; and the love of change, which becomes morbid and

feverish in following the haste of the hunter, and the rage of the

combatant, is at once soothed and satisfied as it watches the wandering

of the tendril, and the budding of the flower. Nor is this all: the new

direction of mental interest marks an infinite change in the means and

the habits of life. The nations whose chief support was in the chase,

whose chief interest was in the battle, whose chief pleasure was in the

banquet, would take small care respecting the shapes of leaves and

flowers; and notice little in the forms of the forest trees which

sheltered them, except the signs indicative of the wood which would make

the toughest lance, the closest roof, or the clearest fire. The

affectionate observation of the grace and outward character of

vegetation is the sure sign of a more tranquil and gentle existence,

sustained by the gifts, and gladdened by the splendor, of the earth. In

that careful distinction of species, and richness of delicate and

undisturbed organization, which characterize the Gothic design, there is

the history of rural and thoughtful life, influenced by habitual

tenderness, and devoted to subtle inquiry; and every discriminating and

delicate touch of the chisel, as it rounds the petal or guides the

branch, is a prophecy of the developement of the entire body of the

natural sciences, beginning with that of medicine, of the recovery of

literature, and the establishment of the most necessary principles of

domestic wisdom and national peace.

§ LXX. I have before alluded to the strange and vain supposition, that

the original conception of Gothic architecture had been derived from

vegetation,--from the symmetry of avenues, and the interlacing of

branches. It is a supposition which never could have existed for a

moment in the mind of any person acquainted with early Gothic; but,

however idle as a theory, it is most valuable as a testimony to the

character of the perfected style. It is precisely because the reverse of

this theory is the fact, because the Gothic did not arise out of, but

develope itself into, a resemblance to vegetation, that this resemblance

is so instructive as an indication of the temper of the builders. It was

no chance suggestion of the form of an arch from the bending of a bough,

but a gradual and continual discovery of a beauty in natural forms which

could be more and more perfectly transferred into those of stone, that

influenced at once the heart of the people, and the form of the edifice.

The Gothic architecture arose in massy and mountainous strength,

axe-hewn, and iron-bound, block heaved upon block by the monk's

enthusiasm and the soldier's force; and cramped and stanchioned into

such weight of grisly wall, as might bury the anchoret in darkness, and

beat back the utmost storm of battle, suffering but by the same narrow

crosslet the passing of the sunbeam, or of the arrow. Gradually, as that

monkish enthusiasm became more thoughtful, and as the sound of war

became more and more intermittent beyond the gates of the convent or the

keep, the stony pillar grew slender and the vaulted roof grew light,

till they had wreathed themselves into the semblance of the summer woods

at their fairest, and of the dead field-flowers, long trodden down in

blood, sweet monumental statues were set to bloom for ever, beneath the

porch of the temple, or the canopy of the tomb.

§ LXXI. Nor is it only as a sign of greater gentleness or refinement of

mind, but as a proof of the best possible direction of this refinement,

that the tendency of the Gothic to the expression of vegetative life is

to be admired. That sentence of Genesis, "I have given thee every green

herb for meat," like all the rest of the book, has a profound symbolical

as well as a literal meaning. It is not merely the nourishment of the

body, but the food of the soul, that is intended. The green herb is, of

all nature, that which is most essential to the healthy spiritual life

of man. Most of us do not need fine scenery; the precipice and the

mountain peak are not intended to be seen by all men,--perhaps their

power is greatest over those who are unaccustomed to them. But trees,

and fields, and flowers were made for all, and are necessary for all.

God has connected the labor which is essential to the bodily sustenance,

with the pleasures which are healthiest for the heart; and while He made

the ground stubborn, He made its herbage fragrant, and its blossoms

fair. The proudest architecture that man can build has no higher honor

than to bear the image and recall the memory of that grass of the field

which is, at once, the type and the support of his existence; the goodly

building is then most glorious when it is sculptured into the likeness

of the leaves of Paradise; and the great Gothic spirit, as we showed it

to be noble in its disquietude, is also noble in its hold of nature; it

is, indeed, like the dove of Noah, in that she found no rest upon the

face of the waters,--but like her in this also, "LO, IN HER MOUTH WAS AN

OLIVE BRANCH, PLUCKED OFF."

§ LXXII. The fourth essential element of the Gothic mind was above

stated to be the sense of the GROTESQUE; but I shall defer the endeavor

to define this most curious and subtle character until we have occasion

to examine one of the divisions of the Renaissance schools, which was

morbidly influenced by it (Vol. III. Chap. III.). It is the less

necessary to insist upon it here, because every reader familiar with

Gothic architecture must understand what I mean, and will, I believe,

have no hesitation in admitting that the tendency to delight in

fantastic and ludicrous, as well as in sublime, images, is a universal

instinct of the Gothic imagination.

§ LXXIII. The fifth element above named was RIGIDITY; and this character

I must endeavor carefully to define, for neither the word I have used,

nor any other that I can think of, will express it accurately. For I

mean, not merely stable, but _active_ rigidity; the peculiar energy

which gives tension to movement, and stiffness to resistance, which

makes the fiercest lightning forked rather than curved, and the stoutest

oak-branch angular rather than bending, and is as much seen in the

quivering of the lance as in the glittering of the icicle.

§ LXXIV. I have before had occasion (Vol. I. Chap. XIII. § VII.) to note

some manifestations of this energy or fixedness; but it must be still

more attentively considered here, as it shows itself throughout the

whole structure and decoration of Gothic work. Egyptian and Greek

buildings stand, for the most part, by their own weight and mass, one

stone passively incumbent on another: but in the Gothic vaults and

traceries there is a stiffness analogous to that of the bones of a limb,

or fibres of a tree; an elastic tension and communication of force from

part to part, and also a studious expression of this throughout every

visible line of the building. And, in like manner, the Greek and

Egyptian ornament is either mere surface engraving, as if the face of

the wall had been stamped with a seal, or its lines are flowing, lithe,

and luxuriant; in either case, there is no expression of energy in

framework of the ornament itself. But the Gothic ornament stands out in

prickly independence, and frosty fortitude, jutting into crockets, and

freezing into pinnacles; here starting up into a monster, there

germinating into a blossom; anon knitting itself into a branch,

alternately thorny, bossy, and bristly, or writhed into every form of

nervous entanglement; but, even when most graceful, never for an instant

languid, always quickset; erring, if at all, ever on the side of

brusquerie.

§ LXXV. The feelings or habits in the workman which give rise to this

character in the work, are more complicated and various than those

indicated by any other sculptural expression hitherto named. There is,

first, the habit of hard and rapid working; the industry of the tribes

of the North, quickened by the coldness of the climate, and giving an

expression of sharp energy to all they do (as above noted, Vol. I. Chap.

XIII. § VII.), as opposed to the languor of the Southern tribes, however

much of fire there may be in the heart of that languor, for lava itself

may flow languidly. There is also the habit of finding enjoyment in the

signs of cold, which is never found, I believe, in the inhabitants of

countries south of the Alps. Cold is to them an unredeemed evil, to be

suffered, and forgotten as soon as may be; but the long winter of the

North forces the Goth (I mean the Englishman, Frenchman, Dane, or

German), if he would lead a happy life at all, to find sources of

happiness in foul weather as well as fair, and to rejoice in the

leafless as well as in the shady forest. And this we do with all our

hearts; finding perhaps nearly as much contentment by the Christmas fire

as in the summer sunshine, and gaining health and strength on the

ice-fields of winter, as well as among the meadows of spring. So that

there is nothing adverse or painful to our feelings in the cramped and

stiffened structure of vegetation checked by cold; and instead of

seeking, like the Southern sculptor, to express only the softness of

leafage nourished in all tenderness, and tempted into all luxuriance by

warm winds and glowing rays, we find pleasure in dwelling upon the

crabbed, perverse, and morose animation of plants that have known little

kindness from earth or heaven, but, season after season, have had their

best efforts palsied by frost, their brightest buds buried under snow,

and their goodliest limbs lopped by tempest.

§ LXXVI. There are many subtle sympathies and affections which join to

confirm the Gothic mind in this peculiar choice of subject; and when we

add to the influence of these, the necessities consequent upon the

employment of a rougher material, compelling the workman to seek for

vigor of effect, rather than refinement of texture or accuracy of form,

we have direct and manifest causes for much of the difference between

the northern and southern cast of conception: but there are indirect

causes holding a far more important place in the Gothic heart, though

less immediate in their influence on design. Strength of will,

independence of character, resoluteness of purpose, impatience of undue

control, and that general tendency to set the individual reason against

authority, and the individual deed against destiny, which, in the

Northern tribes, has opposed itself throughout all ages to the languid

submission, in the Southern, of thought to tradition, and purpose to

fatality, are all more or less traceable in the rigid lines, vigorous

and various masses, and daringly projecting and independent structure of

the Northern Gothic ornament: while the opposite feelings are in like

manner legible in the graceful and softly guided waves and wreathed

bands, in which Southern decoration is constantly disposed; in its

tendency to lose its independence, and fuse itself into the surface of

the masses upon which it is traced; and in the expression seen so often,

in the arrangement of those masses themselves, of an abandonment of

their strength to an inevitable necessity, or a listless repose.

§ LXXVII. There is virtue in the measure, and error in the excess, of

both these characters of mind, and in both of the styles which they have

created; the best architecture, and the best temper, are those which

unite them both; and this fifth impulse of the Gothic heart is therefore

that which needs most caution in its indulgence. It is more definitely

Gothic than any other, but the best Gothic building is not that which is

_most_ Gothic: it can hardly be too frank in its confession of rudeness,

hardly too rich in its changefulness, hardly too faithful in its

naturalism; but it may go too far in its rigidity, and, like the great

Puritan spirit in its extreme, lose itself either in frivolity of

division, or perversity of purpose.[67] It actually did so in its later

times; but it is gladdening to remember that in its utmost nobleness,

the very temper which has been thought most adverse to it, the

Protestant spirit of self-dependence and inquiry, was expressed in its

every line. Faith and aspiration there were, in every Christian

ecclesiastical building, from the first century to the fifteenth; but

the moral habits to which England in this age owes the kind of greatness

that she has,--the habits of philosophical investigation, of accurate

thought, of domestic seclusion and independence, of stern self-reliance,

and sincere upright searching into religious truth,--were only traceable

in the features which were the distinctive creation of the Gothic

schools, in the veined foliage, and thorny fretwork, and shadowy niche,

and buttressed pier, and fearless height of subtle pinnacle and crested

tower, sent like an "unperplexed question up to Heaven."[68]

§ LXXVIII. Last, because the least essential, of the constituent

elements of this noble school, was placed that of REDUNDANCE,--the

uncalculating bestowal of the wealth of its labor. There is, indeed,

much Gothic, and that of the best period, in which this element is

hardly traceable, and which depends for its effect almost exclusively on

loveliness of simple design and grace of uninvolved proportion: still,

in the most characteristic buildings, a certain portion of their effect

depends upon accumulation of ornament; and many of those which have most

influence on the minds of men, have attained it by means of this

attribute alone. And although, by careful study of the school, it is

possible to arrive at a condition of taste which shall be better

contented by a few perfect lines than by a whole façade covered with

fretwork, the building which only satisfies such a taste is not to be

considered the best. For the very first requirement of Gothic

architecture being, as we saw above, that it shall both admit the aid,

and appeal to the admiration, of the rudest as well as the most refined

minds, the richness of the work is, paradoxical as the statement may

appear, a part of its humility. No architecture is so haughty as that

which is simple; which refuses to address the eye, except in a few clear

and forceful lines; which implies, in offering so little to our regards,

that all it has offered is perfect; and disdains, either by the

complexity or the attractiveness of its features, to embarrass our

investigation, or betray us into delight. That humility, which is the

very life of the Gothic school, is shown not only in the imperfection,

but in the accumulation, of ornament. The inferior rank of the workman

is often shown as much in the richness, as the roughness, of his work;

and if the co-operation of every hand, and the sympathy of every heart,

are to be received, we must be content to allow the redundance which

disguises the failure of the feeble, and wins the regard of the

inattentive. There are, however, far nobler interests mingling, in the

Gothic heart, with the rude love of decorative accumulation: a

magnificent enthusiasm, which feels as if it never could do enough to

reach the fulness of its ideal; an unselfishness of sacrifice, which

would rather cast fruitless labor before the altar than stand idle in

the market; and, finally, a profound sympathy with the fulness and

wealth of the material universe, rising out of that Naturalism whose

operation we have already endeavored to define. The sculptor who sought

for his models among the forest leaves, could not but quickly and deeply

feel that complexity need not involve the loss of grace, nor richness

that of repose; and every hour which he spent in the study of the minute

and various work of Nature, made him feel more forcibly the barrenness

of what was best in that of man: nor is it to be wondered at, that,

seeing her perfect and exquisite creations poured forth in a profusion

which conception could not grasp nor calculation sum, he should think

that it ill became him to be niggardly of his own rude craftsmanship;

and where he saw throughout the universe a faultless beauty lavished on

measureless spaces of broidered field and blooming mountain, to grudge

his poor and imperfect labor to the few stones that he had raised one

upon another, for habitation or memorial. The years of his life passed

away before his task was accomplished; but generation succeeded

generation with unwearied enthusiasm, and the cathedral front was at

last lost in the tapestry of its traceries, like a rock among the

thickets and herbage of spring.

§ LXXIX. We have now, I believe, obtained a view approaching to

completeness of the various moral or imaginative elements which composed

the inner spirit of Gothic architecture. We have, in the second place,

to define its outward form.

Now, as the Gothic spirit is made up of several elements, some of which

may, in particular examples, be wanting, so the Gothic form is made up

of minor conditions of form, some of which may, in particular examples,

be imperfectly developed.

We cannot say, therefore, that a building is either Gothic or not Gothic

in form, any more than we can in spirit. We can only say that it is more

or less Gothic, in proportion to the number of Gothic forms which it

unites.

§ LXXX. There have been made lately many subtle and ingenious endeavors

to base the definition of Gothic form entirely upon the roof-vaulting;

endeavors which are both forced and futile: for many of the best Gothic

buildings in the world have roofs of timber, which have no more

connexion with the main structure of the walls of the edifice than a hat

has with that of the head it protects; and other Gothic buildings are

merely enclosures of spaces, as ramparts and walls, or enclosures of

gardens or cloisters, and have no roofs at all, in the sense in which

the word "roof" is commonly accepted. But every reader who has ever

taken the slightest interest in architecture must know that there is a

great popular impression on this matter, which maintains itself stiffly

in its old form, in spite of all ratiocination and definition; namely,

that a flat lintel from pillar to pillar is Grecian, a round arch Norman

or Romanesque, and a pointed arch Gothic.

And the old popular notion, as far as it goes, is perfectly right, and

can never be bettered. The most striking outward feature in all Gothic

architecture is, that it is composed of pointed arches, as in Romanesque

that it is in like manner composed of round; and this distinction would

be quite as clear, though the roofs were taken off every cathedral in

Europe. And yet, if we examine carefully into the real force and meaning

of the term "roof" we shall perhaps be able to retain the old popular

idea in a definition of Gothic architecture which shall also express

whatever dependence that architecture has upon true forms of roofing.

§ LXXXI. In Chap. XIII. of the first volume, the reader will remember

that roofs were considered as generally divided into two parts; the roof

proper, that is to say, the shell, vault, or ceiling, internally

visible; and the roof-mask, which protects this lower roof from the

weather. In some buildings these parts are united in one framework; but,

in most, they are more or less independent of each other, and in nearly

all Gothic buildings there is considerable interval between them.

Now it will often happen, as above noticed, that owing to the nature of

the apartments required, or the materials at hand, the roof proper may

be flat, coved, or domed, in buildings which in their walls employ

pointed arches, and are, in the straitest sense of the word, Gothic in

all other respects. Yet so far forth as the roofing alone is concerned,

they are not Gothic unless the pointed arch be the principal form

adopted either in the stone vaulting or the timbers of the roof proper.

I shall say then, in the first place, that "Gothic architecture is that

which uses, if possible, the pointed arch in the roof proper." This is

the first step in our definition.

§ LXXXII. Secondly. Although there may be many advisable or necessary

forms for the lower roof or ceiling, there is, in cold countries exposed

to rain and snow, only one advisable form for the roof-mask, and that is

the gable, for this alone will throw off both rain and snow from all

parts of its surface as speedily as possible. Snow can lodge on the top

of a dome, not on the ridge of a gable. And thus, as far as roofing is

concerned, the gable is a far more essential feature of Northern

architecture than the pointed vault, for the one is a thorough

necessity, the other often a graceful conventionality: the gable occurs

in the timber roof of every dwelling-house and every cottage, but not

the vault; and the gable built on a polygonal or circular plan, is the

origin of the turret and spire;[69] and all the so-called aspiration of

Gothic architecture is, as above noticed (Vol. I. Chap. XII. § VI.),

nothing more than its developement. So that we must add to our

definition another clause, which will be, at present, by far the most

important, and it will stand thus: "Gothic architecture is that which

uses the pointed arch for the roof proper, and the gable for the

roof-mask."

§ LXXXIII. And here, in passing, let us notice a principle as true in

architecture as in morals. It is not the _compelled_, but the _wilful_,

transgression of law which corrupts the character. Sin is not in the

act, but in the choice. It is a law for Gothic architecture, that it

shall use the pointed arch for its roof proper; but because, in many

cases of domestic building, this becomes impossible for want of room

(the whole height of the apartment being required everywhere), or in

various other ways inconvenient, flat ceilings may be used, and yet the

Gothic shall not lose its purity. But in the roof-mask, there can be no

necessity nor reason for a change of form: the gable is the best; and if

any other--dome, or bulging crown, or whatsoever else--be employed at

all, it must be in pure caprice, and wilful transgression of law. And

wherever, therefore, this is done, the Gothic has lost its character; it

is pure Gothic no more.

§ LXXXIV. And this last clause of the definition is to be more strongly

insisted upon, because it includes multitudes of buildings, especially

domestic, which are Gothic in spirit, but which we are not in the habit

of embracing in our general conception of Gothic architecture;

multitudes of street dwelling-houses and straggling country farm-houses,

built with little care for beauty, or observance of Gothic laws in

vaults or windows, and yet maintaining their character by the sharp and

quaint gables of the roofs. And, for the reason just given, a house is

far more Gothic which has square windows, and a boldly gabled roof, than

the one which has pointed arches for the windows, and a domed or flat

roof. For it often happened in the best Gothic times, as it must in all

times, that it was more easy and convenient to make a window square than

pointed; not but that, as above emphatically stated, the richness of

church architecture was also found in domestic; and systematically "when

the pointed arch was used in the church it was used in the street," only

in all times there were cases in which men could not build as they

would, and were obliged to construct their doors or windows in the

readiest way; and this readiest way was then, in small work, as it will

be to the end of time, to put a flat stone for a lintel and build the

windows as in Fig. VIII.; and the occurrence of such windows in a

building or a street will not un-Gothicize them, so long as the bold

gable roof be retained, and the spirit of the work be visibly Gothic in

other respects. But if the roof be wilfully and conspicuously of any

other form than the gable,--if it be domed, or Turkish, or Chinese,--the

building has positive corruption mingled with its Gothic elements, in

proportion to the conspicuousness of the roof; and, if not absolutely

un-Gothicized, can maintain its character only by such vigor of vital

Gothic energy in other parts as shall cause the roof to be forgotten,

thrown off like an eschar from the living frame. Nevertheless, we must

always admit that it _may_ be forgotten, and that if the Gothic seal be

indeed set firmly on the walls, we are not to cavil at the forms

reserved for the tiles and leads. For, observe, as our definition at

present stands, being understood of large roofs only, it will allow a

conical glass-furnace to be a Gothic building, but will _not_ allow so

much, either of the Duomo of Florence, or the Baptistery of Pisa. We

must either mend it, therefore, or understand it in some broader sense.

[Illustration: Fig. VIII.]

§ LXXXV. And now, if the reader will look back to the fifth paragraph of

Chap. III. Vol. I., he will find that I carefully extended my definition

of a roof so as to include more than is usually understood by the term.

It was there said to be the covering of a space, _narrow or wide_. It

does not in the least signify, with respect to the real nature of the

covering, whether the space protected be two feet wide, or ten; though

in the one case we call the protection an arch, in the other a vault or

roof. But the real point to be considered is, the manner in which this

protection stands, and not whether it is narrow or broad. We call the

vaulting of a bridge "an arch," because it is narrow with respect to the

river it crosses; but if it were built above us on the ground, we should

call it a waggon vault, because then we should feel the breadth of it.

The real question is the nature of the curve, not the extent of space

over which it is carried: and this is more the case with respect to

Gothic than to any other architecture; for, in the greater number of

instances, the form of the roof is entirely dependent on the ribs; the

domical shells being constructed in all kinds of inclinations, quite

undeterminable by the eye, and all that is definite in their character

being fixed by the curves of the ribs.

[Illustration: Fig. IX.]

§ LXXXVI. Let us then consider our definition as including the narrowest

arch, or tracery bar, as well as the broadest roof, and it will be

nearly a perfect one. For the fact is, that all good Gothic is nothing

more than the developement, in various ways, and on every conceivable

scale, of the group formed by the _pointed arch for the bearing line_

below, and _the gable for the protecting line_ above; and from the huge,

gray, shaly slope of the cathedral roof, with its elastic pointed vaults

beneath, to the slight crown-like points that enrich the smallest niche

of its doorway, one law and one expression will be found in all. The

modes of support and of decoration are infinitely various, but the real

character of the building, in all good Gothic, depends upon the single

lines of the gable over the pointed arch, Fig. IX., endlessly rearranged

or repeated. The larger woodcut, Fig. X., represents three

characteristic conditions of the treatment of the group: _a_, from a

tomb at Verona (1328); _b_, one of the lateral porches at Abbeville;

_c_, one of the uppermost points of the great western façade of Rouen

Cathedral; both these last being, I believe, early work of the fifteenth

century. The forms of the pure early English and French Gothic are too

well known to need any notice; my reason will appear presently for

choosing, by way of example, these somewhat rare conditions.

[Illustration: Fig. X.]

§ LXXXVII. But, first, let us try whether we cannot get the forms of the

other great architectures of the world broadly expressed by relations of

the same lines into which we have compressed the Gothic. We may easily

do this if the reader will first allow me to remind him of the true

nature of the pointed arch, as it was expressed in § X. Chap. X. of the

first volume. It was said there, that it ought to be called a "curved

gable," for, strictly speaking, an "arch" cannot be "pointed." The

so-called pointed arch ought always to be considered as a gable, with

its sides curved in order to enable them to bear pressure from without.

Thus considering it, there are but three ways in which an interval

between piers can be bridged,--the three ways represented by A, B, and

C, Fig. XI.,[70] on page 213,--A, the lintel; B, the round arch; C, the

gable. All the architects in the world will never discover any other

ways of bridging a space than these three; they may vary the curve of

the arch, or curve the sides of the gable, or break them; but in doing

this they are merely modifying or subdividing, not adding to the generic

forms.

§ LXXXVIII. Now there are three good architectures in the world, and

there never can be more, correspondent to each of these three simple

ways of covering in a space, which is the original function of all

architectures. And those three architectures are _pure_ exactly in

proportion to the simplicity and directness with which they express the

condition of roofing on which they are founded. They have many

interesting varieties, according to their scale, manner of decoration,

and character of the nations by whom they are practised, but all their

varieties are finally referable to the three great heads:--

A, Greek: Architecture of the Lintel.

B, Romanesque: Architecture of the Round Arch.

C, Gothic: Architecture of the Gable.

[Illustration: Fig. XI.]

The three names, Greek, Romanesque, and Gothic, are indeed inaccurate

when used in this vast sense, because they imply national limitations;

but the three architectures may nevertheless not unfitly receive their

names from those nations by whom they were carried to the highest

perfections. We may thus briefly state their existing varieties.

§ LXXXIX. A. GREEK: Lintel Architecture. The worst of the three; and,

considered with reference to stone construction, always in some measure

barbarous. Its simplest type is Stonehenge; its most refined, the

Parthenon; its noblest, the Temple of Karnak.

In the hands of the Egyptian, it is sublime; in those of the Greek,

pure; in those of the Roman, rich; and in those of the Renaissance

builder, effeminate.

B. ROMANESQUE: Round-arch Architecture. Never thoroughly developed until

Christian times. It falls into two great branches, Eastern and Western,

or Byzantine and Lombardic; changing respectively in process of time,

with certain helps from each other, into Arabian Gothic and Teutonic

Gothic. Its most perfect Lombardic type is the Duomo of Pisa; its most

perfect Byzantine type (I believe), St. Mark's at Venice. Its highest

glory is, that it has no corruption. It perishes in giving birth to

another architecture as noble as itself.

C. GOTHIC: Architecture of the Gable. The daughter of the Romanesque;

and, like the Romanesque, divided into two great branches, Western and

Eastern, or pure Gothic and Arabian Gothic; of which the latter is

called Gothic, only because it has many Gothic forms, pointed arches,

vaults, &c., but its spirit remains Byzantine, more especially in the

form of the roof-mask, of which, with respect to these three great

families, we have next to determine the typical form.

§ XC. For, observe, the distinctions we have hitherto been stating,

depend on the form of the stones first laid from pier to pier; that is

to say, of the simplest condition of roofs proper. Adding the relations

of the roof-mask to these lines, we shall have the perfect type of form

for each school.

[Illustration: Fig. XII.]

In the Greek, the Western Romanesque, and Western Gothic, the roof-mask

is the gable: in the Eastern Romanesque, and Eastern Gothic, it is the

dome: but I have not studied the roofing of either of these last two

groups, and shall not venture to generalize them in a diagram. But the

three groups, in the hands of the Western builders, may be thus simply

represented: _a_, Fig. XII., Greek;[71] _b_, Western Romanesque; _c_,

Western, or true, Gothic.

Now, observe, first, that the relation of the roof-mask to the roof

proper, in the Greek type, forms that pediment which gives its most

striking character to the temple, and is the principal recipient of its

sculptural decoration. The relation of these lines, therefore, is just

as important in the Greek as in the Gothic schools.

[Illustration: Fig. XIII.]

§ XCI. Secondly, the reader must observe the difference of steepness in

the Romanesque and Gothic gables. This is not an unimportant

distinction, nor an undecided one. The Romanesque gable does not pass

gradually into the more elevated form; there is a great gulf between the

two; the whole effect of all Southern architecture being dependent upon

the use of the flat gable, and of all Northern upon that of the acute. I

need not here dwell upon the difference between the lines of an Italian

village, or the flat tops of most Italian towers, and the peaked gables

and spires of the North, attaining their most fantastic developement, I

believe, in Belgium: but it may be well to state the law of separation,

namely, that a Gothic gable _must_ have all its angles acute, and a

Romanesque one _must_ have the upper one obtuse: or, to give the reader

a simple practical rule, take any gable, _a_ or _b_, Fig. XIII., and

strike a semicircle on its base; if its top rises above the semicircle,

as at _b_, it is a Gothic gable; if it falls beneath it, a Romanesque

one; but the best forms in each group are those which are distinctly

steep, or distinctly low. In the figure _f_ is, perhaps, the average of

Romanesque slope, and _g_ of Gothic.

[Illustration: Fig. XIV.]

§ XCII. But although we do not find a transition from one school into

the other in the slope of the gables, there is often a confusion between

the two schools in the association of the gable with the arch below it.

It has just been stated that the pure Romanesque condition is the round

arch under the low gable, _a_, Fig. XIV., and the pure Gothic condition

is the pointed arch under the high gable, _b_. But in the passage from

one style to the other, we sometimes find the two conditions reversed;

the pointed arch under a low gable, as _d_, or the round arch under a

high gable, as _c_. The form _d_ occurs in the tombs of Verona, and _c_

in the doors of Venice.

§ XCIII. We have thus determined the relation of Gothic to the other

architectures of the world, as far as regards the main lines of its

construction; but there is still one word which needs to be added to our

definition of its form, with respect to a part of its decoration, which

rises out of that construction. We have seen that the first condition of

its form is, that it shall have pointed arches. When Gothic is perfect,

therefore, it will follow that the pointed arches must be built in the

strongest possible manner.

[Illustration: Fig. XV.]

Now, if the reader will look back to Chapter XI. of Vol. I., he will

find the subject of the masonry of the pointed arch discussed at length,

and the conclusion deduced, that of all possible forms of the pointed

arch (a certain weight of material being given), that generically

represented at _e_, Fig. XV., is the strongest. In fact, the reader can

see in a moment that the weakness of the pointed arch is in its flanks,

and that by merely thickening them gradually at this point all chance of

fracture is removed. Or, perhaps, more simply still:--Suppose a gable

built of stone, as at _a_, and pressed upon from without by a weight in

the direction of the arrow, clearly it would be liable to fall in, as at

_b_. To prevent this, we make a pointed arch of it, as at _c_; and now

it cannot fall inwards, but if pressed upon from above may give way

outwards, as at _d_. But at last we build as at _e_, and now it can

neither fall out nor in.

§ XCIV. The forms of arch thus obtained, with a pointed projection

called a cusp on each side, must for ever be delightful to the human

mind, as being expressive of the utmost strength and permanency

obtainable with a given mass of material. But it was not by any such

process of reasoning, nor with any reference to laws of construction,

that the cusp was originally invented. It is merely the special

application to the arch of the great ornamental system of FOLIATION; or

the adaptation of the forms of leafage which has been above insisted

upon as the principal characteristic of Gothic Naturalism. This love of

foliage was exactly proportioned, in its intensity, to the increase of

strength in the Gothic spirit: in the Southern Gothic it is _soft_

leafage that is most loved; in the Northern _thorny_ leafage. And if we

take up any Northern illuminated manuscript of the great Gothic time, we

shall find every one of its leaf ornaments surrounded by a thorny

structure laid round it in gold or in color; sometimes apparently copied

faithfully from the prickly developement of the root of the leaf in the

thistle, running along the stems and branches exactly as the thistle

leaf does along its own stem, and with sharp spines proceeding from the

points, as in Fig. XVI. At other times, and for the most part in work in

the thirteenth century, the golden ground takes the form of pure and

severe cusps, sometimes enclosing the leaves, sometimes filling up the

forks of the branches (as in the example fig. 1, Plate I. Vol. III.),

passing imperceptibly from the distinctly vegetable condition (in which

it is just as certainly representative of the thorn, as other parts of

the design are of the bud, leaf, and fruit) into the crests on the

necks, or the membranous sails of the wings, of serpents, dragons, and

other grotesques, as in Fig. XVII., and into rich and vague fantasies of

curvature; among which, however, the pure cusped system of the pointed

arch is continually discernible, not accidentally, but designedly

indicated, and connecting itself with the literally architectural

portions of the design.

[Illustration: Fig. XVI.]

[Illustration: Fig. XVII.]

§ XCV. The system, then, of what is called Foliation, whether simple, as

in the cusped arch, or complicated, as in tracery, rose out of this love

of leafage; not that the form of the arch is intended to _imitate_ a

leaf, but _to be invested with the same characters of beauty which the

designer had discovered in the leaf_. Observe, there is a wide

difference between these two intentions. The idea that large Gothic

structure, in arches and roofs, was intended to imitate vegetation is,

as above noticed, untenable for an instant in the front of facts. But

the Gothic builder perceived that, in the leaves which he copied for his

minor decorations, there was a peculiar beauty, arising from certain

characters of curvature in outline, and certain methods of subdivision

and of radiation in structure. On a small scale, in his sculptures and

his missal-painting, he copied the leaf or thorn itself; on a large

scale he adopted from it its abstract sources of beauty, and gave the

same kinds of curvatures and the same species of subdivision to the

outline of his arches, so far as was consistent with their strength,

never, in any single instance, suggesting the resemblance to leafage by

_irregularity_ of outline, but keeping the structure perfectly simple,

and, as we have seen, so consistent with the best principles of masonry,

that in the finest Gothic designs of arches, which are always _single_

cusped (the cinquefoiled arch being licentious, though in early work

often very lovely), it is literally impossible, without consulting the

context of the building, to say whether the cusps have been added for

the sake of beauty or of strength; nor, though in mediæval architecture

they were, I believe, assuredly first employed in mere love of their

picturesque form, am I absolutely certain that their earliest invention

was not a structural effort. For the earliest cusps with which I am

acquainted are those used in the vaults of the great galleries of the

Serapeum, discovered in 1850 by M. Maniette at Memphis, and described by

Colonel Hamilton in a paper read in February last before the Royal

Society of Literature.[72] The roofs of its galleries were admirably

shown in Colonel Hamilton's drawings made to scale upon the spot, and

their profile is a cusped round arch, perfectly pure and simple; but

whether thrown into this form for the sake of strength or of grace, I am

unable to say.

§ XCVI. It is evident, however, that the structural advantage of the

cusp is available only in the case of arches on a comparatively small

scale. If the arch becomes very large, the projections under the flanks

must become too ponderous to be secure; the suspended weight of stone

would be liable to break off, and such arches are therefore never

constructed with heavy cusps, but rendered secure by general mass of

masonry; and what additional _appearance_ of support may be thought

necessary (sometimes a considerable degree of _actual_ support) is given

by means of tracery.

[Illustration: Fig. XVIII.]

§ XCVII. Of what I stated in the second chapter of the "Seven Lamps"

respecting the nature of tracery, I need repeat here only this much,

that it began in the use of penetrations through the stone-work of

windows or walls, cut into forms which looked like stars when seen from

within, and like leaves when seen from without: the name foil or feuille

being universally applied to the separate lobes of their extremities,

and the pleasure received from them being the same as that which we feel

in the triple, quadruple, or other radiated leaves of vegetation, joined

with the perception of a severely geometrical order and symmetry. A few

of the most common forms are represented, unconfused by exterior

mouldings, in Fig. XVIII., and the best traceries are nothing more than

close clusters of such forms, with mouldings following their outlines.

§ XCVIII. The term "foliated," therefore, is equally descriptive of the

most perfect conditions both of the simple arch and of the traceries by

which, in later Gothic, it is filled; and this foliation is an essential

character of the style. No Gothic is either good or characteristic which

is not foliated either in its arches or apertures. Sometimes the bearing

arches are foliated, and the ornamentation above composed of figure

sculpture; sometimes the bearing arches are plain, and the ornamentation

above them is composed of foliated apertures. But the element of

foliation _must_ enter somewhere, or the style is imperfect. And our

final definition of Gothic will, therefore, stand thus:--

"_Foliated_ Architecture, which uses the pointed arch for the roof

proper, and the gable for the roof-mask."

§ XCIX. And now there is but one point more to be examined, and we have

done.

[Illustration: Fig. XIX.]

Foliation, while it is the most distinctive and peculiar, is also the

easiest method of decoration which Gothic architecture possesses; and,

although in the disposition of the proportions and forms of foils, the

most noble imagination may be shown, yet a builder without imagination

at all, or any other faculty of design, can produce some effect upon the

mass of his work by merely covering it with foolish foliation. Throw any

number of crossing lines together at random, as in Fig. XIX., and fill

their squares and oblong openings with quatrefoils and cinquefoils, and

you will immediately have what will stand, with most people, for very

satisfactory Gothic. The slightest possible acquaintance with existing

forms will enable any architect to vary his patterns of foliation with

as much ease as he would those of a kaleidoscope, and to produce a

building which the present European public will think magnificent,

though there may not be, from foundation to coping, one ray of

invention, or any other intellectual merit, in the whole mass of it. But

floral decoration, and the disposition of mouldings, require some skill

and thought; and, if they are to be agreeable at all, must be verily

invented, or accurately copied. They cannot be drawn altogether at

random, without becoming so commonplace as to involve detection: and

although, as I have just said, the noblest imagination may be shown in

the dispositions of traceries, there is far more room for its play and

power when those traceries are associated with floral or animal

ornament; and it is probable, _à priori_, that, wherever true invention

exists, such ornament will be employed in profusion.

§ C. Now, all Gothic may be divided into two vast schools, one early,

the other late;[73] of which the former, noble, inventive, and

progressive, uses the element of foliation moderately, that of floral

and figure sculpture decoration profusely; the latter, ignoble,

uninventive, and declining, uses foliation immoderately, floral and

figure sculpture subordinately. The two schools touch each other at that

instant of momentous change, dwelt upon in the "Seven Lamps," chap, ii.,

a period later or earlier in different districts, but which may be

broadly stated as the middle of the fourteenth century; both styles

being, of course, in their highest excellence at the moment when they

meet, the one ascending to the point of junction, the one declining from

it, but, at first, not in any marked degree, and only showing the

characters which justify its being above called, generically, ignoble,

as its declension reaches steeper slope.

§ CI. Of these two great schools, the first uses foliation only in large

and simple masses, and covers the minor members, cusps, &c., of that

foliation, with various sculpture. The latter decorates foliation itself

with minor foliation, and breaks its traceries into endless and

lace-like subdivision of tracery.

A few instances will explain the difference clearly. Fig. 2, Plate XII.,

represents half of an eight-foiled aperture from Salisbury; where the

element of foliation is employed in the larger disposition of the starry

form; but in the decoration of the cusp it has entirely disappeared, and

the ornament is floral.

[Illustration: Plate XII.

LINEAR AND SURFACE GOTHIC.]

But in fig. 1, which is part of a fringe round one of the later windows

in Rouen Cathedral, the foliation is first carried boldly round the

arch, and then each cusp of it divided into other forms of foliation.

The two larger canopies of niches below, figs. 5 and 6, are respectively

those seen at the flanks of the two uppermost examples of gabled Gothic

in Fig. X., p. 213. Those examples were there chosen in order also to

illustrate the distinction in the character of ornamentation which we

are at present examining; and if the reader will look back to them, and

compare their methods of treatment, he will at once be enabled to fix

that distinction clearly in his mind. He will observe that in the

uppermost the element of foliation is scrupulously confined to the

bearing arches of the gable, and of the lateral niches, so that, on any

given side of the monument, only three foliated arches are discernible.

All the rest of the ornamentation is "bossy sculpture," set on the broad

marble surface. On the point of the gable are set the shield and

dog-crest of the Scalas, with its bronze wings, as of a dragon, thrown

out from it on either side; below, an admirably sculptured oak-tree

fills the centre of the field; beneath it is the death of Abel, Abel

lying dead upon his face on one side, Cain opposite, looking up to

heaven in terror: the border of the arch is formed of various leafage,

alternating with the scala shield; and the cusps are each filled by one

flower, and two broad flowing leaves. The whole is exquisitely relieved

by color; the ground being of pale red Verona marble, and the statues

and foliage of white Carrara marble, inlaid.

§ CII. The figure below it, _b_, represents the southern lateral door

of the principal church in Abbeville: the smallness of the scale

compelled me to make it somewhat heavier in the lines of its traceries

than it is in reality, but the door itself is one of the most exquisite

pieces of flamboyant Gothic in the world; and it is interesting to see

the shield introduced here, at the point of the gable, in exactly the

same manner as in the upper example, and with precisely the same

purpose,--to stay the eye in its ascent, and to keep it from being

offended by the sharp point of the gable, the reversed angle of the

shield being so energetic as completely to balance the upward tendency

of the great convergent lines. It will be seen, however, as this example

is studied, that its other decorations are altogether different from

those of the Veronese tomb; that, here, the whole effect is dependent on

mere multiplications of similar lines of tracery, sculpture being hardly

introduced except in the seated statue under the central niche, and,

formerly, in groups filling the shadowy hollows under the small niches

in the archivolt, but broken away in the Revolution. And if now we turn

to Plate XII., just passed, and examine the heads of the two lateral

niches there given from each of these monuments on a larger scale, the

contrast will be yet more apparent. The one from Abbeville (fig. 5),

though it contains much floral work of the crisp Northern kind in its

finial and crockets, yet depends for all its effect on the various

patterns of foliation with which its spaces are filled; and it is so cut

through and through that it is hardly stronger than a piece of lace:

whereas the pinnacle from Verona depends for its effect on one broad

mass of shadow, boldly shaped into the trefoil in its bearing arch; and

there is no other trefoil on that side of the niche. All the rest of its

decoration is floral, or by almonds and bosses; and its surface of stone

is unpierced, and kept in broad light, and the mass of it thick and

strong enough to stand for as many more centuries as it has already

stood, scatheless, in the open street of Verona. The figures 3 and 4,

above each niche, show how the same principles are carried out into the

smallest details of the two edifices, 3 being the moulding which

borders the gable at Abbeville, and 4, that in the same position at

Verona; and as thus in all cases the distinction in their treatment

remains the same, the one attracting the eye to broad sculptured

_surfaces_, the other to involutions of intricate _lines_, I shall

hereafter characterize the two schools, whenever I have occasion to

refer to them, the one as Surface-Gothic, the other as Linear-Gothic.

§ CIII. Now observe: it is not, at present, the question, whether the

form of the Veronese niche, and the design of its flower-work, be as

good as they might have been; but simply, which of the two architectural

principles is the greater and better. And this we cannot hesitate for an

instant in deciding. The Veronese Gothic is strong in its masonry,

simple in its masses, but perpetual in its variety. The late French

Gothic is weak in masonry, broken in mass, and repeats the same idea

continually. It is very beautiful, but the Italian Gothic is the nobler

style.

§ CIV. Yet, in saying that the French Gothic repeats one idea, I mean

merely that it depends too much upon the foliation of its traceries. The

disposition of the traceries themselves is endlessly varied and

inventive; and indeed, the mind of the French workman was, perhaps, even

richer in fancy than that of the Italian, only he had been taught a less

noble style. This is especially to be remembered with respect to the

subordination of figure sculpture above noticed as characteristic of the

later Gothic.

It is not that such sculpture is wanting; on the contrary, it is often

worked into richer groups, and carried out with a perfection of

execution, far greater than those which adorn the earlier buildings:

but, in the early work, it is vigorous, prominent, and essential to the

beauty of the whole; in the late work it is enfeebled, and shrouded in

the veil of tracery, from which it may often be removed with little harm

to the general effect.[74]

[Illustration: Fig. XX.]

§ CV. Now the reader may rest assured that no principle of art is more

absolute than this,--that a composition from which anything can be

removed without doing mischief is always so far forth inferior. On this

ground, therefore, if on no other, there can be no question, for a

moment, which of the two schools is the greater; although there are many

most noble works in the French traceried Gothic, having a sublimity of

their own dependent on their extreme richness and grace of line, and for

which we may be most grateful to their builders. And, indeed, the

superiority of the Surface-Gothic cannot be completely felt, until we

compare it with the more degraded Linear schools, as, for instance, with

our own English Perpendicular. The ornaments of the Veronese niche,

which we have used for our example, are by no means among the best of

their school, yet they will serve our purpose for such a comparison.

That of its pinnacle is composed of a single upright flowering plant, of

which the stem shoots up through the centres of the leaves, and bears a

pendent blossom, somewhat like that of the imperial lily. The leaves are

thrown back from the stem with singular grace and freedom, and

foreshortened, as if by a skilful painter, in the shallow marble relief.

Their arrangement is roughly shown in the little woodcut at the side

(Fig. XX.); and if the reader will simply try the experiment for

himself,--first, of covering a piece of paper with crossed lines, as if

for accounts, and filling all the interstices with any foliation that

comes into his head, as in Figure XIX. above; and then, of trying to

fill the point of a gable with a piece of leafage like that in Figure

XX. above, putting the figure itself aside,--he will presently find that

more thought and invention are required to design this single minute

pinnacle, than to cover acres of ground with English perpendicular.

§ CVI. We have now, I believe, obtained a sufficiently accurate

knowledge both of the spirit and form of Gothic architecture; but it

may, perhaps, be useful to the general reader, if, in conclusion, I set

down a few plain and practical rules for determining, in every instance,

whether a given building be good Gothic or not, and, if not Gothic,

whether its architecture is of a kind which will probably reward the

pains of careful examination.

§ CVII. First. Look if the roof rises in a steep gable, high above the

walls. If it does not do this, there is something wrong; the building is

not quite pure Gothic, or has been altered.

§ CVIII. Secondly. Look if the principal windows and doors have pointed

arches with gables over them. If not pointed arches, the building is not

Gothic; if they have not any gables over them, it is either not pure, or

not first-rate.

If, however, it has the steep roof, the pointed arch, and gable all

united, it is nearly certain to be a Gothic building of a very fine

time.

§ CIX. Thirdly. Look if the arches are cusped, or apertures foliated. If

the building has met the first two conditions, it is sure to be foliated

somewhere; but, if not everywhere, the parts which are unfoliated are

imperfect, unless they are large bearing arches, or small and sharp

arches in groups, forming a kind of foliation by their own multiplicity,

and relieved by sculpture and rich mouldings. The upper windows, for

instance, in the east end of Westminster Abbey are imperfect for want of

foliation. If there be no foliation anywhere, the building is assuredly

imperfect Gothic.

§ CX. Fourthly. If the building meets all the first three conditions,

look if its arches in general, whether of windows and doors, or of minor

ornamentation, are carried on _true shafts with bases and capitals_. If

they are, then the building is assuredly of the finest Gothic style. It

may still, perhaps, be an imitation, a feeble copy, or a bad example of

a noble style; but the manner of it, having met all these four

conditions, is assuredly first-rate.

If its apertures have not shafts and capitals, look if they are plain

openings in the walls, studiously simple, and unmoulded at the sides;

as, for instance, the arch in Plate XIX. Vol. I. If so, the building may

still be of the finest Gothic, adapted to some domestic or military

service. But if the sides of the window be moulded, and yet there are no

capitals at the spring of the arch, it is assuredly of an inferior

school.

This is all that is necessary to determine whether the building be of a

fine Gothic style. The next tests to be applied are in order to discover

whether it be good architecture or not: for it may be very impure

Gothic, and yet very noble architecture; or it may be very pure Gothic,

and yet, if a copy, or originally raised by an ungifted builder, very

bad architecture.

If it belong to any of the great schools of color, its criticism becomes

as complicated, and needs as much care, as that of a piece of music, and

no general rules for it can be given; but if not--

§ CXI. First. See if it looks as if it had been built by strong men; if

it has the sort of roughness, and largeness, and nonchalance, mixed in

places with the exquisite tenderness which seems always to be the

sign-manual of the broad vision, and massy power of men who can see

_past_ the work they are doing, and betray here and there something like

disdain for it. If the building has this character, it is much already

in its favor; it will go hard but it proves a noble one. If it has not

this, but is altogether accurate, minute, and scrupulous in its

workmanship, it must belong to either the very best or the very worst of

schools: the very best, in which exquisite design is wrought out with

untiring and conscientious care, as in the Giottesque Gothic; or the

very worst, in which mechanism has taken the place of design. It is more

likely, in general, that it should belong to the worst than the best: so

that, on the whole, very accurate workmanship is to be esteemed a bad

sign; and if there is nothing remarkable about the building but its

precision, it may be passed at once with contempt.

§ CXII. Secondly. Observe if it be irregular, its different parts

fitting themselves to different purposes, no one caring what becomes of

them, so that they do their work. If one part always answers accurately

to another part, it is sure to be a bad building; and the greater and

more conspicuous the irregularities, the greater the chances are that it

is a good one. For instance, in the Ducal Palace, of which a rough

woodcut is given in Chap. VIII., the general idea is sternly

symmetrical; but two windows are lower than the rest of the six; and if

the reader will count the arches of the small arcade as far as to the

great balcony, he will find it is not in the centre, but set to the

right-hand side by the whole width of one of those arches. We may be

pretty sure that the building is a good one; none but a master of his

craft would have ventured to do this.

§ CXIII. Thirdly. Observe if all the traceries, capitals, and other

ornaments are of perpetually varied design. If not, the work is

assuredly bad.

§ CXIV. Lastly. _Read_ the sculpture. Preparatory to reading it, you

will have to discover whether it is legible (and, if legible, it is

nearly certain to be worth reading). On a good building, the sculpture

is _always_ so set, and on such a scale, that at the ordinary distance

from which the edifice is seen, the sculpture shall be thoroughly

intelligible and interesting. In order to accomplish this, the uppermost

statues will be ten or twelve feet high, and the upper ornamentation

will be colossal, increasing in fineness as it descends, till on the

foundation it will often be wrought as if for a precious cabinet in a

king's chamber; but the spectator will not notice that the upper

sculptures are colossal. He will merely feel that he can see them

plainly, and make them all out at his ease.

And, having ascertained this, let him set himself to read them.

Thenceforward the criticism of the building is to be conducted precisely

on the same principles as that of a book; and it must depend on the

knowledge, feeling, and not a little on the industry and perseverance of

the reader, whether, even in the case of the best works, he either

perceive them to be great, or feel them to be entertaining.

FOOTNOTES

[56] The third kind of ornament, the Renaissance, is that in which

the inferior detail becomes principal, the executor of every minor

portion being required to exhibit skill and possess knowledge as

great as that which is possessed by the master of the design; and in

the endeavor to endow him with this skill and knowledge, his own

original power is overwhelmed, and the whole building becomes a

wearisome exhibition of well-educated imbecility. We must fully

inquire into the nature of this form of error, when we arrive at the

examination of the Renaissance schools.

[57] Vide Preface to "Fair Maid of Perth."

[58] The Elgin marbles are supposed by many persons to be "perfect."

In the most important portions they indeed approach perfection, but

only there. The draperies are unfinished, the hair and wool of the

animals are unfinished, and the entire bas-reliefs of the frieze are

roughly cut.

[59] In the eighth chapter we shall see a remarkable instance of

this sacrifice of symmetry to convenience in the arrangement of the

windows of the Ducal Palace.

[60] I am always afraid to use this word "Composition;" it is so

utterly misused in the general parlance respecting art. Nothing is

more common than to hear divisions of art into "form, composition,

and color," or "light and shade and composition," or "sentiment and

composition," or it matters not what else and composition; the

speakers in each case attaching a perfectly different meaning to the

word, generally an indistinct one, and always a wrong one.

Composition is, in plain English, "putting together," and it means

the putting together of lines, of forms, of colors, of shades, or of

ideas. Painters compose in color, compose in thought, compose in

form, and compose in effect: the word being of use merely in order

to express a scientific, disciplined, and inventive arrangement of

any of these, instead of a merely natural or accidental one.

[61] Design is used in this place as expressive of the power to

arrange lines and colors nobly. By facts, I mean facts perceived by

the eye and mind, not facts accumulated by knowledge. See the

chapter on Roman Renaissance (Vol. III. Chap. II.) for this

distinction.

[62] "Earlier," that is to say, pre-Raphaelite ages. Men of this

stamp will praise Claude, and such other comparatively debased

artists; but they cannot taste the work of the thirteenth century.

[63] Not selfish fear, caused by want of trust in God, or of

resolution in the soul.

[64] I reserve for another place the full discussion of this

interesting subject, which here would have led me too far; but it

must be noted, in passing, that this vulgar Purism, which rejects

truth, not because it is vicious, but because it is humble, and

consists not in choosing what is good, but in disguising what is

rough, extends itself into every species of art. The most definite

instance of it is the dressing of characters of peasantry in an

opera or ballet scene; and the walls of our exhibitions are full of

works of art which "exalt nature" in the same way, not by revealing

what is great in the heart, but by smoothing what is coarse in the

complexion. There is nothing, I believe, so vulgar, so hopeless, so

indicative of an irretrievably base mind, as this species of Purism.

Of healthy Purism carried to the utmost endurable length in this

direction, exalting the heart first, and the features with it,

perhaps the most characteristic instance I can give is Stothard's

vignette to "Jorasse," in Rogers's Italy; at least it would be so if

it could be seen beside a real group of Swiss girls. The poems of

Rogers, compared with those of Crabbe, are admirable instances of

the healthiest Purism and healthiest Naturalism in poetry. The first

great Naturalists of Christian art were Orcagna and Giotto.

[65] The reader will understand this in a moment by glancing at Plate

XX., the last in this volume, where the series 1 to 12 represents

the change in one kind of leaf, from the Byzantine to the perfect

Gothic.

[66] The best art either represents the facts of its own day, or, if

facts of the past, expresses them with accessories of the time in

which the work was done. All good art, representing past events, is

therefore full of the most frank anachronism, and always _ought_ to

be. No painter has any business to be an antiquarian. We do not want

his impressions or suppositions respecting things that are past. We

want his clear assertions respecting things present.

[67] See the account of the meeting at Talla Linns, in 1682, given

in the fourth chapter of the "Heart of Midlothian." At length they

arrived at the conclusion that "they who owned (or allowed) such

names as Monday, Tuesday, January, February, and so forth, served

themselves heirs to the same if not greater punishment than had been

denounced against the idolaters of old."

[68] See the beautiful description of Florence in Elizabeth Browning's

"Casa Guidi Windows," which is not only a noble poem, but the only

book I have seen which, favoring the Liberal cause in Italy, gives a

just account of the incapacities of the modern Italian.

[69] Salisbury spire is only a tower with a polygonal gabled roof of

stone, and so also the celebrated spires of Caen and Coutances.

[70] Or by the shaded portions of Fig. XXIX. Vol. I.

[71] The reader is not to suppose that Greek architecture had always,

or often, flat ceilings, because I call its lintel the roof proper.

He must remember I always use these terms of the first simple

arrangements of materials that bridge a space; bringing in the real

roof afterwards, if I can. In the case of Greek temples it would be

vain to refer their structure to the real roof, for many were

hypæthral, and without a roof at all. I am unfortunately more

ignorant of Egyptian roofing than even of Arabian, so that I cannot

bring this school into the diagram; but the gable appears to have

been magnificently used for a bearing roof. Vide Mr. Fergusson's

section of the Pyramid of Geezeh, "Principles of Beauty in Art,"

Plate I., and his expressions of admiration of Egyptian roof

masonry, page 201.

[72] See 'Athenæum,' March 5th, 1853.

[73] Late, and chiefly confined to Northern countries, so that the

two schools may be opposed either as Early and Late Gothic, or (in

the fourteenth century) as Southern and Northern Gothic.

[74] In many of the best French Gothic churches, the groups of figures

have been all broken away at the Revolution, without much harm to

the picturesqueness, though with grievous loss to the historical

value of the architecture: whereas, if from the niche at Verona we

were to remove its floral ornaments, and the statue beneath it,

nothing would remain but a rude square trefoiled shell, utterly

valueless, or even ugly.