that it should be a ruin), I can point out nothing which every lover of the pictur- 

 esque will not see for himself. In that quality it is clearly unequalled amongst 

 our monastic remains ; and whenever people talk of scenes which have afforded 

 them the fulness of delight, this romantic valley, these graceful outlines and 

 sweet tints of stone and foliage, yon broken eastern window — across whose solitary 

 muUion the rising moon will, three nights hence, shine round and broad — are 

 first and last remembered. 



Having been requested to describe this Abbey, I have thought that it would 

 be most useful to give such an outline of the origin and usage of Monastic buildings 

 as may enable persons who read of monks, canons, and friars, and who visit their 

 houses, to form some clear notions of what they were and how they lived. I shall 

 therefore give a short account of Monastic buildings in general, and point out in 

 what respects those of the various religious orders differed from each other, and 

 Tintern from those of its own kind. 



In the early ages of Christianity, the habit (common to different forma of 

 worship) of retiring from the world for purposes of prayer and self-discipline was 

 established in the Church. When the system of solitary retirement had become 

 open to scandal, through its abuse by vicious persons, communities were formed 

 whose members bound themselves to strict discipline as a means towards leading a 

 religious life. St. Benedict, who lived in the sixth century, is credited with hav- 

 ing first drawn up the rules which were, at a later period, firmly established as 

 the regulations of the great Order of Benedictine Monks. 



During the darkest period of the Middle Ages the monasteries increased in 

 number, and, although they suffered much from the troubles of the times, the 

 monks persevered in the cultivation of learning and all the arts and crafts. There 

 still exists at St. Gall, in Switzerland, the plan of a monastry, drawn early in the 

 ninth century, which shows the church of the monks surrounded by a vast num- 

 ber of buUdings devoted to all the purposes of convenient existence. In addition 

 to living and sleeping rooms, there are libraries, schools, guest-houses for rich and 

 poor, store-houses, infirmaries, a surgery, workshops for all manner of trades, 

 servants' quarters, herb gardens, and a cemetery. Indeed it is like the plan of a 

 small town, with the church and the offices of the governing body placed in the 

 centre of the whole. In the more peaceful times of the 11th and 12th centuries, 

 when the Benedictine Order had spread over civilised Europe, the best plan for 

 a monastery was found to be simpler in arrangement than that just mentioned, 

 and was never greatly departed from by any of the religious orders. 



The monastery as then arranged included these essential parts. There 

 was first the Church, the other monastic buildings being grouped on one side of it, 

 instead of surrounding it as in the earlier plan. The four covered walks of the 

 cloister enclosed an open space which was the cloister-garth, the whole being 

 attached to one side of the nave. The buildings on the eastern side of the cloister 

 and adjoining the church, were such as the sacristy and chapter-house devoted to 

 the service of the church and to discipline, those on the side of the cloisters 



