THE

ECLECTIC REVIEW

FOR JULY, 1843.

Art. 1. 1. The True Principles of Pointed or Christian Architecture, set forth in Two Lectures delivered at St. Marie's, Oscott. By A. Welby Pugin, Architect and Professor of Ecclesiastical Antiquities in that College. 4to. pp. 68. 1841. London: Weale. 2. Two Lectures on the Structure and Decorations of Churches. By the Rev. George Ayliffe Poole, M.A., Incumbent of St. James's Church, Leeds. [The Christian's Miscellany, No. I.] London: Rivingtons; Burns; and Houlston and Stoneman. Leeds: Green. VARIOUS causes have recently combined to extend the interest of architectural publications, and even to diffuse throughout the country a disposition to reproduce, in both public and private buildings, the forms in which our forefathers delighted. Among these causes, prominence may be given to two, the church extension movement, and that mystic reverence for ancient forms and ordinances, which, never wholly extinguished in the established communion, has of late been so powerfully revived by the efforts of the Oxford tractarians. New churches are rising up in every part of the kingdom; and their erection has as naturally drawn public attention to the characteristics of ecclesiastical architecture, as the demand for them has, for a season, directed the study of architects themselves rather to the ecclesiastical than the general branch of their professional business, and to ecclesiastical rather than classical models. The clergy have, of course, been largely interested in this building movement; and possessing, as many of them do, from their station in society and elaborate education, a highly-cultivated taste, it was to be expected that this would induce, as it certainly would qualify, them to master both the principles to be applied, and the details to be exemplified, in structures dependent on their patronage.

As one of the fine arts, architecture possesses great interest, even as an abstract study, cultivated through the medium of books and drawings only; but this interest is much enhanced to those who have the opportunity of witnessing the gradual execution of ideas with which they were familiar, when as yet they had no expression but on paper, especially if these ideas were to any extent their own. We may be wrong, but cannot avoid ascribing to this interest of the clergy, the altered and certainly more appropriate characters of recent ecclesiastical structures in this country. The churches erected in the reign of Anne-all of them, if we mistake not, without exception, applications of Roman or civil architecture-will witness for the fashion prevalent in that age; and classical models of a somewhat better character continued to be followed even to our own, as the new church, Marylebone, that erected some years ago in Euston-square, and, to mention no others, those in Langham-place and Regent-street, sufficiently show. But a new era has at length arrived; the pointed, or Gothic architecture, as it is variously called, is now in vogue-a style admirable for the beauty and variety of its forms, its scientific adaptation of building materials, and above all, its exhaustless power over the imagination; although we must concede that it is in the church system of the middle ages-the system of the period when it was first fully developed, and which the Oxford tractarians would revive-that it finds its most elaborate expression, and, as a style, its most ample justification. Our readers will not suppose that we admire that system, because we are unable to withhold our admiration from edifices which, but for it, might never have existed. The most perfect examples of the style being produced in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, and some of the most impressive features of them deriving their origin from ecclesiastical principles and usages which cease to satisfy the reason, wherever the pure light of Scripture has been appreciated, it must be allowed that, as the offspring of art, this style itself cannot be fairly criticised without considering the relation in which it stands to ancient errors and corruptions. Full æsthetic truth, therefore, requires that it should be so discussed; neither could justice be done in any other way to the literature of the subject. On the other hand, it may be said, that if the style in question be consistently applicable only to the principles and usages of the Roman and revived Anglican communions, it is to other religionists of no value-its art is meretricious-and the various associations it supplies to memory, taste, imagination, and feeling, only render it a more seductive snare. This is a subject which, though not unconsidered by us, it will not be necessary to discuss now. We shall, for the present, confine ourselves to some of the more limited topics which occur in the publications

whose titles we have given, reserving the other question for a future time, should some fair occasion for speaking of it coincide with the inclination to do so.

Though Mr. Pugin's is a beautiful work, and very well fulfils its author's object, we cannot say that it fulfils the promise of the title page. It should rather have been entitled 'Principles of Architectural Decoration,'-or, Principles of Architectural Construction, as ascertained from the Purest Models of Pointed or Christian Architecture.' The lectures are, in fact, almost exclusively upon construction, or the conditions to be observed in using architectural materials, stone, timber, and metal; with, every now and then, a severe or sarcastic exposure of some gross violation of taste and science, which the author ascribes to ignorant abandonment of early principles; and (at the close) some remarks on propriety in decoration. The subject, every one will admit, is a useful one, and Mr. Pugin, as we have hinted, illustrates it on the whole very much to the purpose; but certainly the true principles of pointed or Christian architecture' include a theory of its essential forms as beautiful in themselves, and subservient, in consistent combination with each other, to that effect upon the mind, without something of which, no structure whatever can claim to be regarded as a work of high art. This, though known of course to Mr. Pugin, is so lost sight of by him, that he actually (p. 2) characterizes the Grecian, or, as with singular and anachronistic prejudice he chooses to designate it, pagan' architecture as barbarous, because the Grecian architects constructed temples of stone in the same form as they had previously constructed them of wood. Now this appears to us an unpardonable violation of taste and science. We should have thought that the noble simplicity of the Grecian temple would, by its mere effect upon his perception of the beautiful, have preserved him from the unscientific error of either confounding beauty of design with skill in masonry, or treating it as a subordinate and merely accidental thing.

The superior masonry exhibited in pointed architecture is of course unquestionable; so far Mr. Pugin is clearly right; but in deciding on the pretensions of a particular style of architecture, we have to consider the adaptation of its essential forms to the ends which buildings erected in it were intended to serve, and the propriety of its ornamental details. With reference to the former consideration, Mr. Pugin has, in a subsequent page (p. 47), admitted that the temples of the Greeks were suited to the rites performed in them. They were, therefore, consistent in character. Their general form and proportions have excited the admiration of the world, as being in unity, simplicity, and breadth, unrivalled. Mr. Pugin himself

regards their external peristyles as a 'beautiful feature' (p. 47), and in the carved triglyphs, which he rightly calls a representation of the beam ends,' we confess we see a device which, artificially producing in the religious edifices of later periods those necessary features of their earlier temples, thus fixing upon solid stone the memorials of the antiquity of their religion, is an evidence not merely of an imitative, but much more of imaginative power. These observations, however, are not designed to claim for classic models an equality upon the whole with the finest of pointed architecture, which, with equal consistency of character, at least excel them in variety, richness, and sublimity, as well as in constructive science, but merely to vindicate them, as works of art, from the undue depreciation they meet with in various parts of Mr. Pugin's work. And it is at the same time highly proper that we should remember that while all, or nearly all, the characteristic excellencies of Grecian art, respect being had of course to the distinction of order, were, as existing remains sufficiently attest, most frequently exemplified in the same edifice, those of the pointed style must be carefully, and are then with difficulty gathered and deduced from detached portions of several distinct buildings. But if Mr. Pugin be indeed of the opinion that the character of a style of art is thus determinable principally by the profound application of science in the use of material, what will he say of the perpendicular style, with its depressed vaultings and massive pendants? The roof of King's College Chapel, Cambridge, has always commanded admiration for the science displayed in its construction, but no competent judge on that account puts the perpendicular style, of which the depressed arch is a prominent feature, on a level with the severer but more lofty style which preceded it. With this in view, Mr. Pugin himself feels, like every other judge, that constructive art does not entirely decide the comparative excellence of styles, and in estimating the relative merits of the earlier and later Gothic styles, he reasons much more correctly, and on a wider range of principles, than when he so unjustly depreciates the Grecian style.

The principal doctrines advanced in these lectures are, to quote the words of the accompanying prospectus,—

1. That all the ornaments of pure pointed edifices were merely introduced as decorations to the essential constructions of those buildings.

2. That the construction of pointed architecture was varied to accord with the properties of the various materials employed.

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3. That no features were introduced in the ancient pointed edifices, which were not essential either for convenience or propriety.

4. That pointed architecture is most consistent, as it decorates the useful portions of buildings, instead of concealing or disguising them.

5. That true principles of architectural proportion are found only in pointed edifices.

6. That the defects of modern architecture are principally owing to the departure from ancient consistent principles.'

As it is with pointed architecture that we have chiefly to do in the present article, we shall dismiss Nos. 4 and 5 of the preceding enumeration, with a single remark on each.

Mr. Pugin's objection to the proportion of Grecian buildings, appears chiefly to rest on the flatness of the Grecian, as compared with the Gothic roof, (see p. 11.) In this objection we cannot agree. The form of the Grecian pediments is not only consistent but necessary. It is indispensable, to give their temples that breadth and harmony for which they are so distinguished; and indeed presents almost the only contrast we discover in them, one without which their characteristic simplicity would be simple meagreness.

The superior consistency of pointed architecture in decorating instead of concealing the useful portions of buildings, is a doctrine which may be conceded, if the comparison be limited to modern civil architecture, and perhaps some earlier specimens of Roman art; to Grecian architecture the objection does not apply; at least we do not see its application, and Mr. Pugin has offered us no aid in that respect. To the various imitations of ancient art, and applications of ancient forms to totally different modern structures, it, however, applies with great force; and for what Mr. Pugin has brought forward on this subject in pages 5, 8, and 9, as exemplified in St. Paul's Cathedral, he is entitled to the thanks of the profession. He has exposed errors which every youthful architect should carefully avoid; and laid open a principle which, if duly adhered to in practice, would not only put an immediate end to one-half the architectural absurdities which are daily perpetrated, but by materially reducing the cost of buildings by the substitution of really scientific designs, could scarcely fail of having a marked influence in the more general encouragement of architecture.

The chief merit of Mr. Pugin's work lies, however, in the elucidation of the doctrines numbered 1, 2, 3, and 6. No. 1 is well illustrated in the account (pp. 3-6) of the object and character of buttresses, and (pp. 8-10) of pinnacles. His account of ceilings (pp. 6, 7), being short, shall be submitted to the reader. The part referring to the stone pendants of the Tudor period, exhibits the reasons of the objection which many architects of purest taste have taken to those massive miracles of masonry.

'Here again the great principle of decorating utility is to be observed. A stone ceiling is most essential in a large church, both