Fig. 1. Imaginary composition, showing, in the background, the castellated Gothic style of architecture; next the 

 ecclesiastic Gothic ; then, the mixed Gothic ; next, the Grecian, or classical style ; and, lastly, Indian architecture 



all buildings of architectural pretensions partake somewhat of the character of one or 

 the other, and it is well that the leading features of each should be understood. 



"The Gothic Style. — The Castle Character requires massive walls, with very 

 small windows, if any are allowed to appear externally. The correct imitation of this, 

 in modern times, must produce the effect of a prison. 



"The Ahhcy Character requires lofty and large apertures, almost equally inapplica- 

 ble to a house, although, in some few rooms, the excess of light may be subdued by 

 colored glass. But in the A.bbey character it is only the chapel, the collegiate church, 

 the hall, and the library, which furnish models for a palace; all the subordinate parts 

 were the mean habitation of monks, or students, built on so small a scale, and with 

 such low ceilings, that they can not be imitated in a modern palace, without such 

 mixture and modification as tend to destroy the original character ; therefore it is 

 necessary now (as it was formerly) to adopt the mixed style of Queen Elizabeth's 

 Gothic, for modern palaces, if they must be in any style of what is called Gothic. 



" Until the reign of Queen Elizabeth, the large buildings in England had either 

 been castles for security, or colleges and religious retreats. Many of these had been 

 converted into palaces, or altered to adapt them to royal residences, by such chano-es 

 in their original forms, as, at length, introduced that mixed character, called Queen 

 £lizabeth''s, or House Gothic. 



" Yet, a mixed style is generally imperfect : the mind is not easily reconciled to the 

 combination of forms which it has been used to consider distinct, and at variance with 

 each other : it feels an incongruity of character, like an anachronism in the confusion 

 of dates : it is like uniting, in one object, infancy with old age, life with death, or 

 things present with things past. 



"The Grecian Style. — Under this character are included all buildings in Eno-- 

 land, for which models have been furnished from Greece, from Italy, from Syria, and 

 from other countries, unmixed with the Gothic style ; for in all these countries some 

 intermixture of style and dates, in what is called the Grecian character, may be dis- 

 covered : and we are apt to consider, as good specimens, those buildings in which the 

 greatest simplicity prevails, or, in other words, those that are most free from mixture. 

 Simplicity is not less necessary in the Gothic than in the Grecian style; yet it creates 



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