224 Contemporary Evolution. 



of trying to do away with sacred images and image 

 worship is fully realised, the use of such may be expected 

 greatly to increase. The absurdity of trying to do with- 

 out images will be appreciated at its just value when the 

 spread of philosophy will have made it axiomatic that 

 we cannot even think but by the help of sensible images 

 in our minds. The most rigid Puritan, the strictest Ma- 

 hometan, cannot worship without worshipping images 

 the images of his own imagination formed by his own 

 brain images in our own day far from likely to be taken 

 for realities (taken as objectively agreeing with what they 

 represent), and therefore far more misleading than any 

 solid images of wood or stone, against the adequacy of 

 which, as representatives of the divine, we are fully on 

 our guard. 



In ARCHITECTURE again we have now developed a dis- 

 tinction which certainly did not exist in mediaeval times 

 that between sacred and secular buildings. Then all 

 buildings were essentially of one style, and the refectory, 

 or hall of justice, if of sufficient dimensions, might hardly 

 be distinguishable from the nave of a church. The form, 

 however, which church architecture should assume is a 

 matter of keen debate, and mostly between the advo- 

 cates of the pointed style and those who admire modern 

 Italian architecture for church purposes. The arguments 

 by which these two views are supported have been put 

 forward in two articles which appeared in the Dublin Re- 



